Love and a sense of belonging is all Ashlin Thomas dreams about.Greed and power took that dream.Ripped away by tragedy, the one person left in her life was taken.How does someone move on from so much loss?When words spoken from the past allow Ashlin to grasp the future she desires, the harsh reality of life threatens to take it away.Will she sacrifice one love for another? Views: 233
"She looked up and smiled. She had a face of feral sweetness, its color yellow; her eyes were long and dark, her mouth a taut bow, her nostrils upturned as if she were scenting the wind."
In "How Shall I Know You?," a melancholic and ailing writer reluctantly travels east of London to give a lecture before a literary society. Mr. Simister, the organization's secretary, lures the world-weary novelist turned biographer with promises of a modest stipend and lodging at a charming bed-and-breakfast for her trouble. Nevertheless, on that rainy day she meets Mr. Simister at the train station, she wonders why she ever agreed to come in the first place. Driving past steel-shuttered windows and Day-Glo banners, Mr. Simister takes the writer to her hotel for the evening, which turns out to be crumbling and isolated rather than picturesque. As she crosses the threshold into the dank stench of Eccles House she is faced with the feral porter, Louise, and suffers through an evening that may be more than she bargained for.
From Hilary Mantel's brilliant and darkly comic collection of contemporary stories, The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher, comes a tale told with her distinctive blend of subversive wit and gimlet-eyed characterization. "How Shall I Know You?" showcases the extraordinary genius of Hilary Mantel, called one of our "greatest living novelists" (NPR). Views: 233
After her grandfather's death, Emmaline discovers her supposedly deceased father actually lives in Canada. Shocked, she decides to go to him. Accompanied by her friend Jonathan, who harbors a secret love for her, Emmaline arrives in Toronto—to her father's dismay. Will she give up, or will she stay? And will Jonathan have the courage to tell her the truth? Views: 233
A shrieking wind, thick with the sleety snow that knows no mercy nor feels remorse, beat vainly and with savage insolence against the staid windows in the lounging room of one of New York's most desirable clubs—one of those characteristic homes for college men who were up for membership on the day they were born, if one may speak so broadly of the virtue that links the early eighteenth-century graduate with his great-grandson of the class of 1908. Not to say, of course, that the eighteenth-century graduate was so carefully preserved from the biting snowstorm as the fellow of to-day, but that he got his learning in the ancient halls that now grind out his descendants by the hundred, one way or another. It is going much too far to assert that every member of this autocratic club had a colonial ancestor in college, but you'd think so if you didn't pin him down to an actual confession to the contrary. It is likely to be the way with college men who do not owe their degrees to certain mushroom institutions in the West, where electricity and mechanics are considered to be quite as necessary to a young man's equipment as the acquaintance, by tradition, with somebody's great-grandaddy, no matter how eminent he may have been in his primogenial day. Views: 233
Lady, Beware!
Every Sunday afternoon James Fenton and his wife took their usual walk-every Sunday afternoon.The pattern never changed.
Then Fenton reached his breaking point.
The idea of escape had never occurred to him before. But suddenly something clicked in his brain.
"Now, at this minute, "he thought, "one gesture of mine might change someone's future. Theft, fire, faces smashed in . . . murder."
So Fenton chose No. 8 Boulting street as a starting point for the greatest adventure of his life.
He rang the bell and a young woman answered. Fenton had the impulse to say, "I have come to strangle you." Instead he took off his hat and smiled. "Do you rent rooms?" he asked. Views: 233
From the author of the multi-million copy bestseller The Tattooist of Auschwitz comes a new novel based on an incredible true story of love and resilience. Her beauty saved her — and condemned her. Cilka is just sixteen years old when she is taken to Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp in 1942, where the commandant immediately notices how beautiful she is. Forcibly separated from the other women prisoners, Cilka learns quickly that power, even unwillingly taken, equals survival. When the war is over and the camp is liberated, freedom is not granted to Cilka: She is charged as a collaborator for sleeping with the enemy and sent to a Siberian prison camp. But did she really have a choice? And where do the lines of morality lie for Cilka, who was send to Auschwitz when she was stil a child? In Siberia, Cilka faces challenges both new and horribly familiar, including the unwanted attention of... Views: 232
Based on her lauded commencement address at Sarah Lawrence College, this stirring essay by bestselling author Ann Patchett offers hope and inspiration for anyone at a crossroads, whether graduating, changing careers, or transitioning from one life stage to another. With wit and candor, Patchett tells her own story of attending college, graduating, and struggling with the inevitable question, What now?
From student to line cook to teacher to waitress and eventually to award-winning author, Patchett's own life has taken many twists and turns that make her exploration genuine and resonant. As Patchett writes, "'What now?' represents our excitement and our future, the very vitality of life." She highlights the possibilities the unknown offers and reminds us that there is as much joy in the journey as there is in reaching the destination. Views: 232
Fresh from an involuntary crash course in the Stranger Arts, I've a new mystery on my plate: the inexplicable reappearance of a particularly fantastic magickal species. Which is great, don't get me wrong. Rescuing magickal beasts is what we do around here. But the Dappledok Pup hasn't been seen since the seventeen hundreds; so how did we find one, alive and kicking, over two hundred years later? And this beast has a talent for sniffing out treasure, no less. Happenstance? Maybe not. Is there something sinister afoot? And what does any of this have to do with an unusually perambulatory tower? Aided by a talking book, a spriggan with a taste for vintage fashion and the best Waymaster in the business, nothing can stop me from finding out the truth. Can it? Views: 232
MEET THE HARVEY GIRLS: These real-life pioneering women were symbols of elegance in the wild frontier: taming rough manners, falling in love, and changing the face of the West forever.Grace Rogers is ready for the adventure of a lifetime. With her family's farm falling on hard times, she accepts a position with the prestigious Fred Harvey Company and heads for Juniper, New Mexico. There she meets a handsome cowboy who quickly turns her head. Too bad the Harvey Girls are forbidden to marry...Nick Hopkins has a plan: buy a little land, marry, and raise a family—in that order. But after meeting Grace, he can't keep away. Their only choice is to marry in secret...but Nick isn't the only man entranced by Grace's charms, and this unexpected rival doesn't plan on taking no for an answer. He will have her, no matter the cost: to Grace, to Juniper, or to the happily ever after Grace and Nick fought so hard to make their own.Cowboys & Harvey... Views: 232
