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Learning to Talk

A companion piece to the captivating memoir GIVING UP THE GHOST by the Man Booker-winning author, this collection of loosely autobiographical stories locates the transforming moments of a haunted childhood.
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Shadows Wait

1908, Simple, ColoradoLilly Luna's mother gave birth to her in an asylum for the mad. Growing up in an insane asylum exposed her to horrors few could imagine, and yet her compassion and ability to heal frightens the broken and the healthy alike. The town fears her. The sane shun her. Morgan Healy's father runs the creepy and rumor-maligned asylum. Morgan's lineage is filled with insanity. Morgan holds together his crumbling family, hoping to escape his father's legacy and the terrible secret it holds. When Lilly is hired as companion for Morgan's sister, Morgan and Lilly form a reluctant alliance to corral the evil that seeps from Tranquil View and threatens not only the town, but also their growing love.
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Allan Quatermain

Allan Quatermain is a novel by H. Rider Haggard. It is the sequel to Haggard\'s novel King Solomon\'s Mines. At the beginning of the book, Allan Quatermain\'s only son has died and he longs to get back into the wilderness. He persuades Sir Henry Curtis, Captain John Good, and the Zulu chief Umslopogaas to accompany him, and they set out from the coast of east Africa into the territory of the Maasai. While staying with a Scottish missionary, Mr. Mackenzie, they run into a group of Maasai who kidnap Mr. Mackenzie\'s daughter. The Maasai demand the life of Allan Quatermain as ransom, but he instead leads an attack on the Maasai, catching them by surprise and slaughtering them. The group then travel by canoe along an underground river to a lake (which turns out to be the sacred lake of Zu-Vendis) in the kingdom of Zu-Vendis beyond a range of mountains. The Zu-Vendi are a warlike race of white-skinned people isolated from other African races; their capital is called Milosis. At the time of the British party\'s arrival, they are ruled jointly by two sisters, Nyleptha and Sorais. The priests of the Zu-Vendi religion are hostile to the explorers as they had killed hippopotamuses — animals sacred to the Zu-Vendis — on their arrival, but the queens protect them. Both sisters fall passionately in love with Curtis, but Curtis loves only Nyleptha. Together with Nyleptha\'s rejection of the nobleman Nasta, the lord of a highland domain, a civil war breaks out. Sorais\' and Nasta\'s forces fight against those of Nyleptha, Curtis and Quatermain. After a battle in which Queen Nyleptha\'s forces emerge victorious despite being outnumbered, it turns out that Queen Nyleptha is threatened by the treachery of the priests, who plan to murder her in her palace before her army\'s return. Umslopogaas and one loyal warrior manage to save her by defending the main doorway of the palace, while killing the attackers including Nasta and the chief priest Agon, although both are mortally wounded. Defeated and jealous, Sorais takes her own life. Nyleptha and Curtis become queen and king, while Quatermain dies from a wound suffered in the battle.
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Hearts to Be Mended

A lady in love. A gentleman with a reputation. And a secret that keeps them apart. LADY ELEANOR ABBOTT is in love. However, the one man who manages to send her heart into an uproar with a single smoldering look is the one man she is forbidden to marry. As the fifth son of a baron, the man who conquered Eleanor’s heart is not the match her mother wants her to make. Instead, Eleanor finds herself faced with an endless stream of appropriate suitors and under stern instructions to choose a suitable husband before the season’s end. HENRY WALTHAM, fifth son of Baron Caulfield, has always considered himself fortunate to have grown up in a close-knit family. However, now that his brother’s less than respectable reputations ruin his every chance to marry the woman he loves, Henry finds himself torn between simply whisking her off to Gretna Green - and let propriety be damned! - and the deep desire to prove himself an honourable man. However, not everything is as it seems, and soon Eleanor and Henry realise that the key to their future can only be found in the past. This tale by a USA TODAY bestselling author shows that love isn’t always easy…but worth fighting for. If you like bittersweet stories about a love so deep and compelling that it unhinges your whole world and leaves you reeling, then you’ll love this instalment of Bree Wolf’s emotionally charged Forbidden Love Novella Series. Buy HEARTS TO BE MENDED, grab a cup of tea, settle into your favorite reading spot and start this swoon worthy romance now! A Forbidden Love Novella Series 1 The Wrong Brother 2 A Brilliant Rose 3 The Forgotten Wife 4 An Unwelcome Proposal 5 Rules to Be Broken 6 Hearts to Be Mended To Follow: 7 Winning her Hand 8 Conquering her Heart Love's Second Chance Series 1 Forgotten & Remembered - The Duke's Late Wife 2 Cursed & Cherished - The Duke's Wilful Wife 3 Despised & Desired - The Marquess' Passionate Wife 4 Abandoned & Protected - The Marquis' Tenacious Wife 5 Ruined & Redeemed - The Earl's Fallen Wife 6 Betrayed & Blessed - The Viscount's Shrewd Wife 7 Deceived & Honoured - The Baron’s Vexing Wife More to follow: 8 Sacrificed & Reclaimed - The Soldier's Daring Widow (Bonus Novella)
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Wainer

The man in the purple robe was too old to walk or stand. He was wheeled upon a purple bench into the center of a marvelous room, where unhuman beings whom we shall call "They" had gathered and waited. Because he was such an old man, he commanded a great sum of respect, but he was nervous before Them and spoke with apology, and sometimes with irritation, because he could not understand what They were thinking and it worried him. Yet there was no one left like this old man. There was no one anywhere who was as old -- but that does not matter. Old men are important not for what they have learned, but for whom they have known, and this old man had known Wainer. Therefore he spoke and told Them what he knew, and more that he did not know he was telling. And They, who were not men, sat in silence and the deepest affection, and listened. . . .
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Sizzle

New York Times-bestselling author Garwood weaves magnificent stories of passion, adventure, and intrigue. Now she raises the heat and spices up the action with a sexy, smart, daring new heroine and a smoldering thriller.
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The Promise

James B. Hendryx (1880-1963) was the author of more than 50 novels and anthologies, and wrote hundreds of stories. And Hendryx wrote what he knew, spending time in Alaska, Canada, and the Wyoming badlands. But he’s best known for his characters set around the outlaw community of Halfaday Creek in the Yukon. Set during the Gold Rush of the late 1890s, Hendryx penned over a hundred stories featuring these characters over the span of 25 years for magazines such as West, Dime Western, New Western, Argosy, and the primary home for the Halfaday Creek series, Short Stories.
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I promessi sposi. English

Set in Lombardy during the Spanish occupation of the late 1620s, The Betrothed tells the story of two young lovers, Renzo and Lucia, prevented from marrying by the petty tyrant Don Rodrigo, who desires Lucia for himself. Forced to flee, they are then cruelly separated, and must face many dangers including plague, famine and imprisonment, and confront a variety of strange characters - the mysterious Nun of Monza, the fiery Father Cristoforo and the sinister \'Unnamed\' - in their struggle to be reunited. A vigorous portrayal of enduring passion, The Betrothed\'s exploration of love, power and faith presents a whirling panorama of seventeenth-century Italian life and is one of the greatest European historical novels.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Views: 289