Showing results by narrator "Melissa" in All Categories

For Regina Miller, the new Morning Star Marketplace is a chance to share her secret work with the world - without revealing herself. Old Order Amish forbid the creation of art without purpose, but without a husband, Regina has been free to explore the joy of painting in her attic. Yet when Gabe Flaud's curiosity leads him to speculate that Regina herself is the painter, the full weight of their community's judgement falls on her shoulders. When Gabe stands up to defend Regina, questioning the Order's restrictions, he reveals his own guilty secret and is shunned along with her.

Written in the then fashionable style form of letters between the characters in the book, Jane Austen tells the story of the beautiful widow Lady Susan. Lady Susan has an eye toward re-marrying well, and marrying off her teenage daughter. To achieve her objectives, she spins a tale of Victorian humor and manipulation. In the end, she outsmarts even herself. Jane Austen's earliest known serious work, Lady Susan is a short, epistolary novel that portrays a woman bent on the exercise of her own powerful mind and personality to the point of social self-destruction.

Classic movie buff Bailey "Mink" Rydell has spent months crushing on a witty film geek she only knows online by "Alex". Two coasts separate the teens until Bailey moves in with her dad, who lives in the same California surfing town as her online crush. Faced with doubts (what if he's a creep in real life - or worse?), Bailey doesn't tell Alex she's moved to his hometown. Or that she's landed a job at the local tourist-trap museum. Or that she's being heckled daily by the irritatingly hot museum security guard, Porter Roth - a.k.a. her new arch-nemesis.

Thief. Enforcer. Womanizer. Billionaire Antonio Andrade has been called all these things. His road to respectability has been buried in bloodshed. And his foes are waiting for him to have it all, so they can rip everything away. Framed. Threatened. Abducted. Virologist Charlotte "Charly" Bennett is in a tailspin of trouble. The man who kidnapped her thinks she's guilty of the bioweapon he wants to destroy. Agreeing to be used as bait could be her one chance to reclaim a normal life...if she survives.

Grab your tickets for Cajun Country Live!, the pickers' and crooners' answer to the legendary New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Maggie Crozat, proprietor of the Crozat Plantation B&B, plans to be in the cheering section when her friend Gaynell Bourgeois takes the stage with her band, Gaynell and the Gator Girls. The festival's headliner, native daughter Tammy Barker, rocketed to stardom on a TV singing competition. When a member of Tammy's entourage is murdered at the festival, Tammy makes sure Gaynell is number one on the suspect list.

Lidia Yuknavitch is a proud misfit. That wasn't always the case. It took Lidia a long time to not simply accept but appreciate her misfit status. Having flunked out of college twice (and maybe even a third time that she's not going to tell you about), with two epic divorces under her belt, an episode of rehab for drug use, and two stints in jail, she felt like she would never fit in. She was a hopeless misfit. She'd failed as daughter, wife, mother, scholar - and yet the dream of being a writer was stuck like "a small sad stone" in her throat.

As if a run-in with an old flame and a failed marriage proposal weren't enough to horrify Krissy for one night, a woman is found strangled to death in a room filled with ominous jack-o'-lanterns. All signs suggest a crime of passion - but when the hostess's jewelry disappears, malevolent intentions seem way more likely.

War of the Spider Queen author Richard Lee Byers. The Rite is the second title in a trilogy exploring the ancient secrets of dragon society in the Forgotten Realms world. Author Richard Lee Byers will write the entire trilogy, and the cover art for the trilogy and the associated anthology will be rendered by award-winning fantasy artist Matt Stawicki.

Aros trained his whole life to become a leader of Sparta, destined to lead the finest. During a brief peace with Athens, the two sides engage in a joint training at sea. Aros finds himself thrust into command when his superior leaves to avoid a coming storm. Except the brewing squall is supernatural, brought on the by the Gods. Poseidon tests the warriors’ mettle, and after a fierce battle, broaches an offer: be forgotten to history, or travel to Drakor where only one species out of ten practices Hellenism—humans.

Isis Blake hasn't fallen in love in three years, 43 weeks, and two days. Or so she thinks. The boy she maybe-sort-of-definitely loved and sort-of-maybe-definitely hated has dropped off the face of the planet in the face of tragedy, leaving a Jack Hunter-shaped hole. Determined to be happy, Isis fills it in with lies and puts on a brave smile for her new life at Ohio State University. But the smile lasts only until he shows up.

Not all alphas are good men. Charlie learned that lesson the hard way. After losing her daughter's father in a senseless act of violence, she hasn't figured out how to move on. She's trapped in a cycle of guilt and misery. It makes her the perfect target for a man who only wants to control her and exploit her impulses. A chance introduction at a neighbor's barbecue changes everything.

Former FBI Agent Jordan Rashid has been tasked with infiltrating a terrorist cell located in Washington, DC. But when he receives an email link with a video of a young girl being held captive by kidnappers, his mission becomes very personal—the 11-year-old Bryn is the daughter he didn’t know he had.

Alyssa Masters had been accused of a horrible crime she didn’t commit and was now the most hated woman in America. She’d lost people she’d loved, her credibility, and a part of her life. To get it back on track, she returns home to live with her mother, and has all but given up on any hope at a normal life.

All too often society issues dire warnings about the risks of living single. But is finding a spouse or romantic partner really a requirement for a full life? In Single at Heart, Dr. Bella DePaulo speaks on behalf of the millions of people who are drawn to single life for all it has to offer and shares what it means to not just be happy being single for a time, but to be happy being single always.

Olivia Glass, 34, turns her back on her life as a high-powered executive in Chicago and relocates to Tuscany, determined to start a new, simpler life - and to grow her own vineyard. Olivia is stunned when she discovers the treasure map may lead to a historic wine cellar, hidden on her estate, filled with priceless wine. It seems like the stuff of dreams - until a dead body puts her at the center of the high-stakes discovery, and turns her heaven into a hell.

This is the San Francisco Series Finale: a collection of 3 short stories about each featured couple in the series. The events take place after each story's respective Epilogue. Epilogues are nice, but they're a snapshot in time. Maybe it's a year after the end of the book or even just six months. Maybe there's a proposal or a wedding. Maybe a character announces she's pregnant. Maybe a character just got their dream job. This group of short stories will give you a glimpse into the future of the characters.

Mourning the loss of her cousin and missing bond, Dyna lies trapped with the enemy. Alone and afraid, the time has come to be her own savior. She will use every skill and spell her Guardians taught her to survive. Because the damsel is dead. This time, she fights. Cassiel and the Guardians are desperate to find their Maiden. Except they cannot do it alone. The journey to cross Troll Bridge proves harder than ever as they race against the impending winter.

Six years earlier, Trina Grissom disappeared, on the run for her life. Now living under an assumed identity - as Samantha Marsh - she still struggles with the dark secret she harbors and the fear she might one day be found. When she moves to the coastal town of Rarity Cove, South Carolina, to open a cafe, a handsome widower begins to chip away at the walls she's built to protect herself. Mark St. Clair lost his wife two years ago in a tragic accident. He distracts himself from his lingering grief by running the family business and caring for his troubled young daughter.

It's 16-year-old Edie who finds their mother, Marianne, dangling in the living room from an old jump rope, puddle of urine on the floor, barely alive. Upstairs, 14-year-old Mae had fallen into one of her trances, often a result of feeling too closely attuned to her mother's dark moods. After Marianne is unwillingly admitted to a mental hospital, Edie and Mae are forced to move from their childhood home in Louisiana to New York to live with their estranged father, Dennis, a former civil rights activist and literary figure on the other side of success.

When COVID-19 hit the United States, New York governor Andrew Cuomo was thrust onto the national stage, hailed around the globe for his leadership. Alongside him every step of the way, Melissa DeRosa quickly became a household name. In her riveting memoir, DeRosa details her journey as a young woman in politics rising to the highest levels of government, writing with raw honesty and vulnerability about the personal challenges she faced—a failing marriage, infertility, death threats, misogyny—while navigating unprecedented professional landmines along the way.