Showing results by narrator " Joel Froomkin" in All Categories

Napoleon has England on edge. For the cunning and conniving Becky Sharp, it’s an opportunity to take advantage of the chaos and improve her lowly station. Her friend Amelia Sedley, a blue-blood pawn, affords Becky entrée into the moneyed class. As the guileless Amelia pines for a rakish soldier, the ruthless Becky climbs upward, setting the stage for a domestic battlefield of greed, ambition, deception, and dizzying reversals of love and fortune.

I didn't know who I was. The official story was shipwreck, and, though I know there was more to it than that, I never asked. Life for me began eight years ago when my uncles fished me from the sea. Keeping me had meant one more blanket on a floor and one more plate on a table that had little enough to start with. I was quick to find ways to make up the difference. I had skills that helped me to pick my marks and contribute my share. I also had plenty to learn about life on the street.

Originally published in 1928, the second and final Winnie-the-Pooh volume by A.A. Milne follows Pooh Bear and the rest of his friends living in the Hundred Acre Wood—including the newest addition to the cast, Tigger.

Runaway Zelda Wilder will do whatever it takes to secure a better life for her and her sister, Ava. Crown Prince Rowan Westringham Tate will do whatever it takes to preserve his small country. "Playboy Prince" MacCallum Lockwood Tate will do whatever it takes to steal Zelda's heart.... When Zee is blackmailed into humiliating the brooding future king, she never expects to be pulled into a web of international intrigue - or to fall for Rowan's naughty younger brother, Cal.

Eager to escape London following the scandal of her husband's death, Lady Fieldhurst accepts an invitation to spend the summer in rural Yorkshire as the guest of Sir Gerald and Lady Hollingshead. She soon discovers, however, that country life is not the panacea she had hoped for. Tension reigns and tempers flare at Hollingshead Place, due in large part to Lady Hollingshead's ambitions for her daughter, a lovely young lady destined for a brilliant marriage in spite of her love for a penniless curate.

This combination of serious artistic engagement with warmth and clarity of prose revels in the experiences and pleasures of art and the body, identity, and community.

When one of his colleagues witnesses a robbery in which one of the participants, a child, bears a striking resemblance to a certain Bow Street Runner, John Pickett realizes he has a young half-brother who has been “apprenticed” to a criminal gang. The brutal murder of the pursuing constable makes the crime far more serious than a simple robbery would be - and 10-year-old Kit is linked to the crime by the toy soldier he dropped while fleeing the scene.

"Twilight meets Outlander"! From USA Today best-selling series Vampire Girl, comes the next book in the saga: Moonlight Prince. For fans of Twilight, A Shade of Vampire, and Outlander, experience a fantasy romance with an original twist on an old tale. I was an ordinary girl, living an ordinary life, until I sold my soul to save my mother. Now the final battle approaches, and I am not prepared.

Having resigned his position at Bow Street in disgrace (at least in his own mind) and failed in his attempt to establish himself as a private agent, John Pickett toils away at a tedious job as a clerk in the city. When he is approached by a man wishing to hire him to extract a young lady being held against her will at an asylum for opium-eaters, Pickett jumps at the chance to prove himself, and has a very reluctant Julia commit him to the institution as a patient. But nothing at the Larches is exactly as it seems.

After a modest wedding ceremony, Bow Street Runner John Pickett and his bride, Julia, the former Lady Fieldhurst, set out for a wedding trip to Somersetshire, where Pickett must face his greatest challenge yet: meeting his in-laws. Sir Thaddeus and Lady Runyon are shocked at their daughter’s hasty remarriage - and appalled by her choice of a second husband. Pickett, for his part, is surprised to learn that Julia once had an elder sister: Claudia, Lady Buckleigh, who disappeared 13 years earlier.

Heir to the most notorious clan in the Highlands, Hugh MacIain hides his identity while imprisoned in the bowels of Fort William's hell. Aye, this braw warrior has endured horrors that should have seen him dead, though now it appears it's the bloody flux that will send him to Satan's fire. Optimistic, competent, and captivating, Charlotte Hill takes pity on the fevered prisoner sprawled atop a cot in the fort's surgery. When finally the Highlander opens his eyes, he seizes her heart with a pained stare.

Eddie Kensington had certain responsibilities, up until two weeks ago. Dress well, smile in public, uphold the family honor. Be straight. Never talk about being bisexual, or being in love with his bodyguard, Isaac Cole, for nearly 10 years. Protecting his mother and siblings from yet more tabloid scandal in the wake of his parents' high-profile divorce was always more important. Up until two weeks ago, when he was outed by the press. Now he's in the midst of an unscheduled identity crisis, and his entire family seems to be joining in.

As author Ethan Mordden looks back at Chicago's various moving parts - including the original 1926 play that started it all, a sexy silent film directed by Cecil B. DeMille, a talkie remake with Ginger Rogers, the musical itself, and at last the movie of the musical - we learn how the American theater serves as a kind of alternative news medium, a town crier warning the public about the racy, devious interior contradictions of American society. Opinionated, witty, and rich in backstage anecdotes, All That Jazz brings the American musical to life in all its artistry and excitement.

Welcome to Willow Creek. People are happy, crime is practically nonexistent, and life is good...unless you're Sabine Crowley. Sabine has been chosen to be the next blood bag for the vampire lord who has protected the town from otherworldly creatures for 200 years. Remy has been summoned by his maker, Bastian, to take his place beside his maker in the hierarchy of vampires inhabiting Willow Creek. He's repulsed by the whole situation. Sabine is terrified of him and her strange attraction to him.

When Andra wakes up, she's drowning. Not only that, but she's in a hot, dirty cave, it's the year 3102, and everyone keeps calling her Goddess. When Andra went into a cryonic sleep for a trip across the galaxy, she expected to wake up in 100 years, not 1,000. Worst of all, the rest of the colonists - including her family and friends - are dead. They died centuries ago, and for some reason, their descendants think Andra's a deity. She knows she's nothing special, but she'll play along if it means she can figure out why she was left in stasis and how to get back to Earth.

Richard, Lord Ramsay, has been brought up from the cradle with a consciousness of his duty to his family and his name. His sense of responsibility has led him to install two elderly aunts in the Dower House; educate his cousin Peter Ramsay and employ him as a steward; and provide a home for poor relation Jane Hawthorne, who once served as his mother's companion.

Francis Bacon is charged with investigating the murder of a fellow barrister at Gray's Inn. He recruits his unwanted protégé Thomas Clarady to do the tiresome legwork. The son of a privateer, Clarady will do anything to climb the Elizabethan social ladder. Bacon's powerful uncle, Lord Burghley, suspects Catholic conspirators of the crime, but other motives quickly emerge. Rival barristers contend for the murdered man's legal honors and wealthy clients. Highly-placed courtiers are implicated as the investigation reaches from Whitehall to the London streets. Bacon does the thinking; Clarady does the fencing. Everyone has something up his pinked and padded sleeve. Even the brilliant Francis Bacon is at a loss - and in danger - until he sees through the disguises of the season of Misrule.

It has been eight years since the Callahans defeated Avian Doers and conquered Chicago. Melody is now the Governor and public face of the family, while Liam rises as the Ceann na Conairte of both the Irish and Italians. Their reach is limitless; their power endless, but is it possible to have too much power? Can Liam and Melody raise a family, a city, and an empire? Only a fool would try to stop them now.

Everything I've done, everything I will do, there will be no regret. The world is a vicious place for a woman. It's even crueler to the daughter of the Ceann na Conairte - discarded, married off, left powerless. But I am no ordinary daughter of the mafia. Unlike every other mafia family, my mother was Melody Callahan, Bloody Mel, the Don of the Italian Mafia, and the Don didn't raise some precious mafia princess. Bone by bone she broke me first, so no one else could - and bone by bone, I pieced myself back together.

Doug wants his rescuer, Julie, to be happy. He is loyal and loves her unconditionally - two things that can’t be said about Julie’s married boss and lover, Luke. Yet Julie is reluctant to break up, afraid to end up like her eccentric cat-owning neighbor. It’s a prospect that horrifies Doug, too. Newly divorced Tom, on the other hand, is perfect for Julie. Everyone can see it - except for Julie and Tom. Doug is confident that with his help they will get over their initial animosity toward each other.