Showing results by narrator "Carrington Macduffie" in All Categories

'There are certain women,' Truman Capote wrote, 'who, though perhaps not born rich, are born to be rich.' These women captivated and enchanted Capote - he befriended them, received their deepest confidences, and ingratiated himself into their lives. From Barbara 'Babe' Paley to Lee Radziwill (Jackie Kennedy's sister) they were the toast of mid-century New York, each beautiful and distinguished in her own way. For years, Capote had been trying to write what he believed would be his magnum opus, Answered Prayers.

Jaded from her years in the music business, perpetually hungover, and diagnosed with career-ending vocal problems, Lillian cobbles together a nationwide farewell tour featuring some old hands from her early days playing honky-tonk bars in Washington State and Nashville, plus a few new ones. She yearns to feel the rush of making live music one more time and bask in the glow of a packed house before she makes the last, and most important, stop on the tour: the farm she left behind at age ten and the sister she is finally ready to confront about an agonizing betrayal in their childhood.

When an English tycoon dies mysteriously, he leaves a note naming six people who might have wanted him dead. Daisy Kean and PI Harry Montana team up to take the suspects - and also six red herrings - on a Mediterranean cruise, culminating at his beautiful villa on Capri, where his will is to be read and the killer unmasked. With the beautiful seaside settings plus the beginnings of a romance between loner Montana and wary Daisy, passions flare and the mystery deepens.

They're an unlikely couple: Lucky Smith, passionate environmentalist and old-time hippie, and Paul Keller, chief constable of Trafalgar, British Columbia. Their weekend getaway to a Scottish-inspired castle in the Rocky Mountains is a chance to explore their fledgling late-in-life relationship and indulge themselves at the famous Banff Springs Hotel. Trouble interferes when Lucky, strong willed and sometimes too stubborn for her own good, stands up to two bullies in the local coffeeshop. To his horror, Paul recognizes one of the young men as his estranged son, Matt.

Tristan MacGregor is famed throughout the Highlands as a silver-tongued seducer and an unrepentant rogue. Bold and charming, he’s dallied with many women, yet none as mysterious as the lass he steals a kiss from at king’s court. Little does he know this beauty is one of his clan’s greatest enemies.

The Los Angeles Times affectionately referred to Freddy Powers as the "Ol Blue Eyes' of Country Music" and wrote that if you were to "ask country superstars Willie Nelson, George Jones or Merle Haggard (they'll)...tell you that he's one of country music's best-kept secrets". The Texas Country Music Hall of Fame inductee has been to the top of the charts as both a producer for Willie Nelson's Grammy-winning LP Over the Rainbow and a songwriter for many of country music legend Merle Haggard's number one hits.

The uplifting science of posttraumatic growth presents groundbreaking research and proven methods to survive and thrive in the face of challenges. Twelve inspiring role models share their profound insights on how they emerged from hardship stronger, wiser, and more compassionate - including civil rights icon Maya Angelou, who healed deep childhood trauma, and flight surgeon Rhonda Cornum, who found a new purpose after being captured in Iraq.

It’s the end of March, and Trafalgar, British Columbia, is preparing for the last influx of skiers for the season. Schools are closed for a week, with teachers, parents, and students preparing to relax at home or head out on vacation. But for Cathy Lindsay, the week of relaxation doesn’t work out as planned when she is gunned down by a sniper on the hiking trail high above town, her small dog the only witness. Cathy - a middle-aged, middle-class, small-town resident, high school English teacher, and married mother of two - is an unlikely candidate for a murderous ambush. As Sergeant John Winters begins his investigation, he finds himself frustrated at every turn.

When Alessandra Lamont is nearly blown to pieces in a mafia hit, the last thing she wants is to place her trust into the hands of sexy, loose-cannon federal agent Harry O'Dell, who'll do whatever it takes to bring the mob down - even if it means sticking like glue to this blonde bombshell who unwittingly married into it. She needs him if she wants to stay alive, and he needs her if he is to exact his revenge for the death of his wife and son.

The latest developments in physics have the potential to radically revise our understanding of the world: its makeup, its evolution, and the fundamental forces that drive its operation. Knocking on Heaven's Door is an exhilarating and accessible overview of these developments and an impassioned argument for the significance of science. There could be no better guide than Lisa Randall.

Four mysterious words prompt antiques dealer Precious Rafferty to embark on a quest across Europe to uncover their meaning. Preshy, at age 38, loves her American-in-Paris life, but thinks that she'll never be swept off her feet: until she meets Bennett James. As their whirlwind courtship progresses, though, she realizes that there is much about his business life in Shanghai she doesn't know. Then she receives an urgent message from Lily Song, a cousin she's never met.

In the middle of the Great Depression, Montana native Julia Bennett arrived in New York City with no money and an audacious business plan: to identify and visit easterners who could afford to spend their summers at her brand new dude ranch near Ennis, Montana. Julia, a big-game hunter whom friends described as “a clever shot with both rifle and shotgun,” flouted gender conventions to build guest ranches in Montana and Arizona that attracted world-renowned entertainers and artists.

In The Voice Is All, Joyce Johnson - coauthor of the classic memoir Door Wide Open, about her relationship with Jack Kerouac - brilliantly peels away layers of the Kerouac legend to show how, caught between two cultures and two languages, he forged a voice to contain his dualities. Looking more deeply than previous biographers into how Kerouac's French Canadian background enriched his prose and gave him a unique outsider's vision of America, she tracks his development from boyhood through the phenomenal breakthroughs of 1951 that resulted in the composition of On the Road.

For years, Alfred Ludens has pursued mathematician and philosopher Marcus Vallar in the belief that he possesses a profound metaphysical formula, a missing link of great significance to mankind. Luden's friends are more sceptical. Jack Sheerwater, painter, thinks Marcus is crazy. Gildas herne, ex-preist, thinks he is evil. Patrick Fenman, poet, is dying because he thinks Marcus has cursed him. Marcus has disappeared and must be found.

Deborah Santana is best known for her marriage to music icon Carlos Santana, a 30-year bond that endures to this day. But as a girl growing up in San Francisco in the 1960s, daughter of a White mother and a Black father, the legendary blues guitarist Saunders King, her life was charged with its own drama long before she married.

Truly Plaice, an overly large and ungainly girl, is the polar opposite of her sister, Serena Jane, the epitome of feminine perfection. With their parents dead, Truly and Serena Jane are separated: Serena Jane to live a life of privilege as the future May Queen and Truly to live on the outskirts of town, the subject of constant abuse and humiliation.

A respected surgeon and rare book collector is brutally murdered in his elegant Manhattan home, just hours after showing a book dealer the fifteenth-century manual of black magic - a grimoire - he'd received from a grateful patient. Now the healer's blood is everywhere - and only the priceless grimoire is missing. The horrific death of her beloved father has shattered Beatrice O'Connell's quiet, sane, and orderly world.

A body is found just blocks from attorney Sarah Woolson’s peaceful Rincon Hill home. Sarah is soon on the case, but nineteenth-century San Francisco is rapidly thrown into a state of panic as a gruesome crime spree begins to take hold of the city. Engaged in a life or death struggle to find the murderer, Sarah becomes embroiled in the erotic escapades of the town’s infamous high-end brothels, a proper Anglican church, Darwin’s shocking theory of evolution, and a vicious killer who will stop at nothing to achieve a scandalous objective.

The heroic story of Pussy Riot, who resurrected the power of truth in a society built on lies. On February 21, 2012, five young women entered the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow. In neon-colored dresses, tights, and balaclavas, they performed a “punk prayer” beseeching the “Mother of God” to “get rid of Putin.” They were quickly shut down by security, and in the weeks and months that followed, three of the women were arrested and tried, and two were sentenced to a remote prison colony. But the incident captured international headlines, and footage of it went viral.

Oh no, I'm turning into my mother! Every woman is familiar with the poignant, funny, baffling, or horrifying echoes that resonate at that moment when she first hears her own mother's voice coming out of her mouth. But this moment of recognition is more than ironic: It's at the root of how we see ourselves, and how we plot and follow the arc that goes from childhood to motherhood.