Ms. Romance, Hannah Arden, writes one of the top read relationship advice columns in the nation. Mr. Reality, Brooks North, writes the top read relationship advice column.
Ms. Romance believes in true love and soul mates. Mr. Reality believes love is a term humanity has assigned to the primal instinct to procreate. She believes in fate—he in chance. She knows there’s one right person for everyone—he knows there are multiple ones. The two writers couldn’t be more polarized on relationships. They’re professional rivals, and philosophical antagonists.
For eight years, their battles have been fought with words and ink. That changes when they apply for the same position at the World Times and find themselves face-to-face for the first time. Brooks isn’t the sour-faced, antiquity of a man Hannah pictured. And Hannah isn’t exactly the middle-aged shrew with cat hair on her housedress that Brooks imagined either.
In lieu of competing for the promotion traditional ways, the two writers are presented with playing the leading roles in a social experiment unlike any before. Can a person be tricked into falling in love? Can a relationship be crafted under the right string of circumstances? Hannah knows the answer. So does Brooks.
Agreeing to the terms, the two set out on a three-month dating experiment, live-streamed for the world to watch. All Hannah has to do to win is not fall in love with the narcissistic brute. All Brooks has to do is get the starry-eyed dreamer to fall in love with him. Both are so confident in their philosophies, they expect the challenge to be easy.
With the world watching, Brooks and Hannah will be forced to confront their beliefs and conclude, once and for all, who’s right. The answer is one neither of them saw coming. Views: 709
Ben Holiday, mere mortal turned monarch of the magic kingdom of Landover, has grappled with numerous contenders for his throne, but nothing could have prepared him for the most daunting of challengers: his headstrong teenage daughter, Mistaya. After getting suspended from an exclusive private school in our world, Mistaya is determined to resume her real education—learning sorcery from court wizard Questor Thews—whether her parents like it or not. Then, horrified that a repulsive Landover nobleman seeks to marry her, Mistaya decides that the only way to run her own life is to run away from home.
So begins an eventful odyssey peppered with a formidable dragon, recalcitrant Gnomes, an inscrutable magic cat, a handsome librarian, a sinister sorcerer, and more than a few narrow escapes as fate draws Landover’s intrepid princess into the thick of a mystery that will put her mettle to the test—and possibly bring the kingdom to its knees. Views: 709
Franny's supposed to be working this summer, not flirting. But you can't blame her when guys like Alex and Harry are around. . . .
Franny Pearson never dreamed she'd be attending the prestigious Mansfield Summer Theater Program. And she's not, exactly. She's working for her aunt, the resident costume designer. But sewing her fingers to the bone does give her an opportunity to spend time with her crush, Alex Braverman. If only he were as taken with the girl hemming his trousers as he is with his new leading lady.
When Harry Cartwright, a notorious flirt, shows more than a friendly interest in Franny, she figures it can't hurt to have a little fun. But as their breezy romance grows more complicated, can Franny keep pretending that Harry is just a carefree fling? And why is Alex suddenly giving her those deep, meaningful looks? In this charming tale of mixed messages and romantic near-misses, one thing is clear: Flirting might be more trouble than Franny ever expected. Views: 709
Five Flash Fiction horror pieces, all under 1000 words. Each piece also includes a brief afterword from the author with a bit of background on where he got the idea for the story.A little insight into the life and mind of a horror writer.Five Flash Fiction horror pieces, all under 1000 words. Each piece also includes a brief afterword from the author with a bit of background on where he got the idea for the story.A little insight into the life and mind of a horror writer.Approx. 7000 words (roughly 28 pages)Includes:- "The Professional Crier"The tears of high school outcast Penny Circe can bring back the dead. At least temporarily.- "I Spy With My Little Eye"Anthony Monsano has gone through hell to finally find himself in possession of the round box. The question is, what’s inside?- "Run, Rabbit. Run."Pete Cantrell hates jackrabbits. Unfortunately, his home is surrounded by them. And something else as well.- "The Death He Expected"A group of boys on a midnight, full moon trip to an Indian burial site get more than just a practical joke.- "Another Oldie But Goodie"Retirement home resident Margaret Daniels is hearing music that no one else can hear, a song she hasn’t heard in almost 50 years. Views: 709
Following on Two Pints, another hilarious book on everything that matters from the brilliant Roddy Doyle.
Two men meet for a pint -- or two -- in a Dublin pub. They chew the fat, set the world to rights, curse the ref, say a last farewell. In this second collection of delicious comic dialogues Doyle's drinkers ponder:
• a topless Kate Middleton
• Barack and Michelle Obama
• David Beckham ("Would you tattoo your kids' names on the back of your neck?" "They wouldn't fit.")
• Jimmy Savile ("a gobshite")
• the financial crisis (again)
• abortion (again)
• and horsemeat in your burger...
Once again, those we have lost troop through their thoughts -- Lou Reed, Seamus Heaney, Reg Presley, Nelson Mandella, Phil Everly, Margaret Thatcher, Shirley Temple -- and they still have that unerring ability to ask the really fundamental questions like "Would you take penalty points for your missis?" Views: 709
The Talleyrand Maxim by J. S. Fletcher Views: 708
Seventeen-year-old Ava-Claire Sullivan's mother is dying. Perhaps it's no surprise, then, that her greatest solace comes from someone who's already dead.
Peter Hart saves her one night in a graveyard from an attacker just as strange as he is, and now Ava can't stop thinking about him. She wants to see him again – even after he warns her he's dangerous, and she begins to realize what he is. Her best friends don't know anything about death, but Peter does, intimately. He's waiting for her the next night she comes to the cemetery, and the next...
But their growing bond comes up against a promise Peter made a long time ago, a promise that could destroy them both. Now Ava has to decide just what she's willing to give up to hold onto the one thing that could last forever. Views: 708
"Jim Harrison's new book, The Summer He Didn't Die, is a collection of novellas showcasing the flair that has made him a contemporary master of the form, and a celebration of love, the senses, and family, no matter how untraditional." The Summer He Didn't Die exults with life and all its magic. In the title novella, Brown Dog, a hapless Michigan Indian loved by Harrison's readers, is trying to parent his two step-children and take care of his family's health on meager resources - it helps a bit that his charms are irresistible to the new dentist in town. Republican Wives is a witty satire on the sexual neuroses of the Right, the mystery of why any person desires another, and the irrational power of love that, when thwarted, can turn so easily into an urge to murder. Tracking is a meditation on Harrison's fascination with place, telling his own familiar mythology through the places he has seen and the intellectual loves he has known in a vivid stream of consciousness that transfigures how we look at our own surroundings. Views: 708
Set in a working-class Brooklyn neighborhood in 1947, this poignant tale revolves around two of the most endearing characters in recent fiction: an 11-year-old Irish Catholic boy named Michael Devlin and Rabbi Judah Hirsch, a refugee from Prague. Views: 708
Bestselling author Thomas Keneally brings to life the vast range of characters who have formed our national story, in the second volume of a unique history of Australia. Views: 708
Michael Chabon’s Pulitzer Prize-winning bestseller, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, sprang from an early passion for the derring-do and larger-than-life heroes of classic comic books. Now, once more mining the rich past, Chabon summons the rollicking spirit of legendary adventures–from The Arabian Nights to Alexandre Dumas to Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories–in a wonderful new novel brimming with breathless action, raucous humor, cliff-hanging suspense, and a cast of colorful characters worthy of Scheherazade’s most tantalizing tales.
They’re an odd pair, to be sure: pale, rail-thin, black-clad Zelikman, a moody, itinerant physician fond of jaunty headgear, and ex-soldier Amram, a gray-haired giant of a man as quick with a razor-tongued witticism as he is with a sharpened battle-ax. Brothers under the skin, comrades in arms, they make their rootless way through the Caucasus Mountains, circa A.D. 950, living as they please and surviving however they can–as blades and thieves for hire and as practiced bamboozlers, cheerfully separating the gullible from their money. No strangers to tight scrapes and close shaves, they’ve left many a fist shaking in their dust, tasted their share of enemy steel, and made good any number of hasty exits under hostile circumstances.
None of which has necessarily prepared them to be dragooned into service as escorts and defenders to a prince of the Khazar Empire. Usurped by his brutal uncle, the callow and decidedly ill-tempered young royal burns to reclaim his rightful throne. But doing so will demand wicked cunning, outrageous daring, and foolhardy bravado . . . not to mention an army. Zelikman and Amram can at least supply the former. But are these gentlemen of the road prepared to become generals in a full-scale revolution? The only certainty is that getting there–along a path paved with warriors and whores, evil emperors and extraordinary elephants, secrets, swordplay, and such stuff as the grandest adventures are made of–will be much more than half the fun.
From the Hardcover edition. Views: 708
Aging Larry Cook announces his intention to turn over his 1,000-acre farm--one of the largest in Zebulon County, Iowa--to his three daughters, Caroline, Ginny, and Rose. A man of harsh sensibilities, he carves Caroline out of the deal because she has the nerve to be less than enthusiastic about her father's generosity. While Larry Cook deteriorates into a pathetic drunk, his daughters are left to cope with the often grim realities of life on a family farm--from battering husbands to cutthroat lenders. In this winner of the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, Smiley captures the essence of such a life with stark, painful detail. Views: 708
Meet the Rabbitte family, motley bunch of loveable ne'er-do-wells whose everyday purgatory is rich with hangovers, dogshit and dirty dishes. When the older sister announces her pregnancy, the family is forced to rally together and discover the strangeness of intimacy. But the question remains: which friend of the family is the father of Sharon's child? Views: 707
Love and evil know no bounds! Turn the page and enter a world of shadow, as Michael West brings together his most disturbing short stories--twisted tales of forbidden desires and ghoulish deeds, where nightmares manifest in the most mundane and unlikely of places... The basement of a Japanese restaurant, where a seductive creature promises comfort to a lonely hitman, if only he will set her free... A ruined city, where survivors of a natural disaster have become prey to something unnatural... An Indiana farmhouse, where a frightened child attempts to fool the Angel of Death... And the darkest regions of space, where a man fights to protect the woman he loves from invaders only he can see... Ten reasons to lock your doors. Ten reasons to keep the lights on. Ten reasons why you may never sleep again. Praise for Skull Full of Kisses "(Michael West) gave me nightmares!" Anne Boedeker, E! -Entertainment Television "This is damned serious stuff, and it's scary, suspenseful, and sweat-inducing; but more importantly - perhaps most importantly - it's all disturbing as hell, and cannot be easily forgotten." Gary A. Braunbeck, author of Coffin Countyand Mr. Hands (on Dark Harvest) "Michael West proves himself to be a masterful storyteller, flawless in building momentum, and his skills in characterization match or even often surpass some of the most successful writers in the business." Nicholas Grabowsky, author of Halloween 4: the Return of Michael Myers, and The Everborn (on The Wide Game) Views: 707
