Showing results by narrator "Amy McFadden" in All Categories

Agnes Hussein, descendant of the last sultan of Singapore and the last surviving member of her immediate family, has grown up among her eccentric relatives in the crumbling Kampong Glam palace, a once-opulent relic given to her family in exchange for handing over Singapore to the British. Now Agnes is seventeen and her family has fallen into genteel poverty, surviving on her grandfather’s pension and the meager income they receive from a varied cast of boarders.

When journalist Rachel Elliot is assigned to cover the demolition of the supposedly haunted Taylor mansion, Rachel's deep-seated cynicism quickly tells her there's something behind billionaire Peter Cameron's fierce commitment to raze the old place. As Rachel investigates, passions begin to flare between her and Peter, just as horrifying secrets are revealed about their pasts and a decades-old mystery. As Rachel's and Peter's feelings intensify, Rachel has an eerie sense that they've both been here before....

Lillian is a 40-something mother whose life is miserable. Her husband hits her when he drinks and her grown daughter treats her as a servant. Realizing that she is wasting time on two people who just don't care, Lillian leaves her little family of self-indulgent narcissists in search of a more meaningful life.

Mallory Dane has a great family (at least on the surface), is popular at school (as long as she doesn’t make waves), and dates an amazing boyfriend, Todd (who happens to be completely made up). Boys - and sex - are something Mallory just can’t deal with, so she created her “invisible guy” to avoid it all. But when Liam Crawford comes along - a real guy, flesh and bones and strumming his guitar - Mallory starts questioning her fictional relationship.

After 28 years of playing by the rules, Jessica Gregory moves from her small Indiana town to Phuket, Thailand. But her newfound routine is upended with the arrival of Grant Flynn, a captivating, elusive man who is sailing around the world while trying to move on from a past tragedy. Jessica volunteers to help crew Grant's boat, Imagine, on a passage across the Indian Ocean and finds herself falling in love with him as the voyage gets underway.

It's been 12 years since ER nurse Frankie Stapleton fled the quiet banks of Stillwater, but with her sister's pregnancy taking a dangerous turn and a string of failed relationships in Chicago hanging over her, Frankie is back and hoping to put the past behind her. Within minutes of arriving at Stillwater General Hospital, however, she ends up saving a man's life, only to have him turn up dead hours later - and the hospital blames Frankie.

People spend their entire lives staving off the dark - but no matter the measures taken, black paths and shadowy pits lurk in the unlikeliest of places, waiting to pull the unwary into the depths of despair. These 11 tales offer a morbid sampling of the many forms and fashions of terror - from the subtle prickling of neck hairs at the kiss of a ghostly breeze to the raw-throated screams and feverish clawing of a desperate fight for survival.

It’s been fifteen years since Mandy Reasoner was murdered - a crime for which her boyfriend, Duke, was convicted. But when high school students and best friends Betty and June discover that Mandy was June’s long-forgotten aunt, they decide to pursue the mystery. Galvanized by the growing community who doubts the evidence against Duke and is rallying to free him, the two girls start on a path that will bring them not only to Duke himself but smack into Nickel, tough-as-nails teenage P.I. attempting to keep his own life together.

On a far future space station, once each year, nano-engineered young women run genetically engineered tyrannosaurs in a race as brutal and bloody as any witnessed in the Roman Circus 3,000 years before. Egret thinks she is ready for this day. She has been brainwashed for it, trained for it, shaped and reshaped into a sacrificial model of beauty for the entertainment of millions. Her world is one of strict regimen and fierce competition, one in which others can only be competitors or worshippers, never friends.

Camille Douglas has one last article to write for the travel magazine she works for before officially retiring and becoming a full-time novelist. She’s tasked to cover her editor’s favorite spot on the East Coast: Hope Lake, PA. Of course, she’s heard the stories and seen the pictures, but she’s doubtful it looks that idyllic in person.

As the youngest mayor Trillium Bay has ever elected, Brooke Callaghan wants to prove she’s up to the challenge. She’s stepping out of her practical teacher flats and into her sister’s treacherously high heels...with disastrous results. But if she’s going to (literally) stumble her first day on the job, why not fall into the arms of a handsome stranger? Leo Walker is a rarity on Wenniway Island. Not only handsome, he’s also single, funny, and - most importantly - interested in Brooke.

Grace first met Mimi when she blew into their sons’ toddler playgroup like a warm bay breeze that loosened Grace’s tight spaces. Despite differing approaches to life and parenting, the fast friends raised their kids together while cementing a sisterlike bond that neither believed could be broken. But when a string of ill-fated decisions results in a teen party with a tragic outcome for Grace’s son, the friendship is ripped apart and an already-splintered community explodes.

Antalek's tale of the trials and many tribulations of the hapless and more than a little dysfunctional Haas family recalls the work of Sue Miller and Ann Beattie - and is a wonderful introduction to a superb writer whose short fiction has been nominated for numerous awards, including the Glimmer Train's Family Matter's and Short-Story Award and the Bellingham Review's Tobias Wolff Award for Fiction.

While renovating her childhood home into a B&B and navigating the waters of a second-chance romance, Beck Foster is suddenly forced to face the past and open her arms to strangers she never dreamed she’d meet. With the help of her daughters, Savannah and Peyton, Beck resolves to undo the past and expand her family forever...but that decision isn't always easy. As Savannah faces the challenges of having a baby on her own, and Peyton takes her budding romance to the next step, the Foster women all learn that life in the Keys might be warm and breezy, but it’s still complicated.

From the creator of the popular What’s the Difference? newsletter, a whimsical and practical reference for food nerds and novices alike, covering dozens of culinary topics, that clears up confusion over similar terms, techniques, dishes, and more.

Renegade rich girl Andy Kendricks isn't the belle of any Dallas ball - and that's just the way the debutante dropout likes it! She's got a good life and a great man: her defense attorney boyfriend, Brian Malone. Brian's such a straight arrow that he had to be dragged kicking and screaming to a close friend's bachelor party at a sleazy local "gentlemen's club".

They call them "pretty parties", and they're the latest rage among Dallas debutantes - get-togethers with light refreshments, heavy gossip, and Dr. Sonja and her magic Botox needles. Former socialite Andy Kendricks normally wouldn't be caught dead at such an event, but she's attending as a favor to her friend Janet, a society reporter in search of a juicy story. And, boy, does she find one when aging beauty queen Miranda DuBois bursts into the room - drunk, disorderly, and packing a pistol.

In the fourth installment of Cindy Kirk's beloved Good Hope series, a ruse with an old flame grows into romance. Delphinium "Fin" Bloom returns to her hometown with one goal: get the mayor - her former flame - to approve a location shoot in Good Hope. But business turns personal when the two become entangled in a fake engagement to comfort his ailing grandmother.

It's a piece of news Daphne never expected to hear: Her globe-trotting friend Skylar, who vowed never to get married, is engaged! Time to celebrate in Manhattan - Skylar's treat, of course. After years scaling the corporate ladder, she can more than afford it. Daphne arrives in NYC with news of her own - the novel she's finally finished appears to be going nowhere but the trash bin of every publishing house around. She's devastated, but plans to keep her disappointment under wraps.

Covert FBI agent Court Gentry loves his brothers, his job, and his Harley-Davidson. Once he loved a girl, too, but when she broke his heart, he put his emotions on lockdown...until she crosses his path again. On vacation six years ago, free-spirited Lauren Montgomery fell hard for Court Gentry. She returned home happier than ever, only to descend into a spiral of abuse by her ex-husband, Stephan. When Stephan threatened to kill any man who touched her, Lauren cut Court from her life - but not from her heart.