The bucolic rural farming area of East Cape Girardeau on the Mississippi across from Mingo National Wildlife Refuge is disturbed by a renegade cop. A gambling man and a serial abuser, he is chased down by his own police department after a hot game of Texas Hold 'Em at the local casino goes bad. Join the chase as this corrupt cop runs into the Ozarks when his own son turns against him with the support of our three main female characters.
BUY ANY TWO BOOKS IN THE SILVER LAKE SERIES AND GET FREE SHIPPING whether or not you have Amazon Prime! This summer Sylvia Reynolds comes to visit her aunt, famous documentary film maker Asia Reynolds. Fifteen year old Sylvie is in no mood for anything new and her aunt's barn load of animals is way exactly NOT what Sylvie is in any mood for. Although compared with adults, Aunt Asia's livestock quickly becomes more appealing. After being shunted from her best friend's house to her grandfather's to her aunt's she is a little too open to being accepted by the wrong crowd. That wrong crowd is Bertram Thomas, son of an abusive father. Bert and Sylvie have something in common, both were raised without their mothers. This forms a very strong bond between the two teenagers. Bertram responds positively to the love of pretty, little Sylvie Reynolds. There trying to end that relationship is bad cop, Officer Carlton Thomas, the father of converted "bad-boy bully" Bert Thomas -- a former town troublemaker. That's where our story begins... Officer Thomas comes under constant suspicion for several local crimes. It is the responsibility of his son and Carlton's old friend, the Chief of the Silver Lake Police, to delicately and safely try and round him up. As Asia helps with the investigation, her new animal menagerie increases from a pretty brown and tan donkey with huge ears, named Pumpkin (or Punkin) and a red, long-haired Chihuahua named Fuzzy Bud, to two new very fiesty, cute goats -- Thelma and Louise, as well as a quickly growing St. Bernard puppy named "Junior," a couple of baby chicks, a duckling and a gosling (adopted from Frankie Franklin's private animal rescue). Seems that Asia cannot help adopting new animals that tickle her fancy. The story increases in intrigue as Officer Carlton Thomas rampages around the sleepy hamlet of Silver Lake, threatening and annoying many of its residents.
You know those stories - where guy meets girl, they fall for each other, life does its best to tear them apart, but in the end, love conquers all and they embark on their life together? Yeah? Well, this isn't one of those stories. This is more like some old country song. A song about a man and a woman who've already lived through great highs and lows. A man and a woman who've reached their fifties and who, despite humble beginnings have achieved great things in different ways. He's had an amazing career as one of country music's biggest names. She's raised a daughter and given her everything she needed to go out and succeed in the world. They've both given their all to their chosen path in life, and when those paths cross, two lonely hearts finally see their chance at true happiness.It's hardly a spoiler to say that an old country song might end with the sun setting over two rocking chairs on a front porch. You'll have to pick up your copy of this heart-warming romance today to find out if Marianne and Clay's story ends that way. This book is intended for readers aged 18+
From the author of American Bloomsbury, Louisa May Alcott, and Home Before Dark, a major reassessment of the life and work of the novelist, painter, and playwright considered to be one of America’s preeminent twentieth-century poets. At the time of his death in 1962, at age sixty-eight, he was, after Robert Frost, the most widely read poet in the United States. E. E. Cummings was and remains controversial. He has been called “a master” (Malcolm Cowley); “hideous” (Edmund Wilson). James Dickey called him a “daringly original poet with more vitality and more sheer uncompromising talent than any other living American writer.” In Susan Cheever’s rich, illuminating biography we see Cummings’s idyllic childhood years in Cambridge, Massachusetts; his Calvinist father—distinguished Harvard professor and sternly religious minister of the Cambridge Congregational Church; his mother—loving, attentive, a source of encouragement, the aristocrat of the family, from Unitarian writers, judges, and adventurers. We see Cummings—slight, agile, playful, a product of a nineteenth-century New England childhood, bred to be flinty and determined; his love of nature; his sense of fun, laughter, mimicry; his desire from the get-go to stand conventional wisdom on its head, which he himself would often do, literally, to amuse. At Harvard, he roomed with John Dos Passos; befriended Lincoln Kirstein; read Latin, Greek, and French; earned two degrees; discovered alcohol, fast cars, and burlesque at the Old Howard Theater; and raged against the school’s conservative, exclusionary upper-class rule by A. Lawrence Lowell. In Cheever’s book we see that beneath Cummings’s blissful, golden childhood the strains of sadness and rage were already at play. He grew into a dark young man and set out on a lifelong course of rebellion against conventional authority and the critical establishment, devouring the poetry of Ezra Pound, whose radical verses pushed Cummings away from the politeness of the traditional nature poem toward a more adventurous, sexually conscious form. We see that Cummings’s self-imposed exile from Cambridge—a town he’d come to hate for its intellectualism, Puritan uptightness, racism, and self-righteous xenophobia—seemed necessary for him as a man and a poet. Headstrong and cavalier, he volunteered as an ambulance driver in World War I, working alongside Hemingway, Joyce, and Ford Madox Ford . . . his ongoing stand against the imprisonment of his soul taking a literal turn when he was held in a makeshift prison for “undesirables and spies,” an experience that became the basis for his novel, The Enormous Room. We follow Cummings as he permanently flees to Greenwich Village to be among other modernist poets of the day—Marianne Moore, Hart Crane, Dylan Thomas—and we see the development of both the poet and his work against the backdrop of modernism and through the influences of his contemporaries: Stein, Amy Lowell, Joyce, and Pound. Cheever’s fascinating book gives us the evolution of an artist whose writing was at the forefront of what was new and daring and bold in an America in transition. (With 28 pages of black-and-white images.)
Cal’s hoping that he’s going to be able to adjust to retirement. He’s not the kind of man who knows how to relax and do nothing. He’s glad to be in Summer Lake with guys he used to work with—guys who’ve already made the transition from covert ops to a more regular kind of life. His friends have met women and settled down with them, though. And that’s not in the cards for Cal. As far as he’s concerned, the female of the species may as well be a different species. When he first meets Teresa, she only confirms for him that he has no clue how women operate. But she makes him want to figure it out. She’s a breath of fresh air that he doesn’t know how to handle. She’s very much her own person, but before long, she has Cal wanting to figure out how to make her his person. Teresa’s bowled over by the big, sexy, serious-looking guy who walks into her salon. After a less than auspicious beginning, she’s left disappointed. But not for long. He might seem serious and a little bit intimidating, but Teresa can see through the tough exterior to the big-hearted guy underneath. These two might not look like the perfect match on paper. But he makes her feel cared for in a way she never has before. And she brings out his softer side—and his smile, and boy what a smile it is! Pick up your copy of this heartwarming romance today to follow Cal and Teresa’s journey. You’ll laugh and cry with them as they get a little help from his friends, and from her three-year-old granddaughter on their way to finding their happily-ever-after. Sometimes is Never Enough – More than Sometimes –
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the author of Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? and creator of The Mindy Project and Never Have I Ever comes a hilarious collection of essays about her ongoing journey to find contentment and excitement in her adult life. “This is Kaling at the height of her power.”—USA Today In Why Not Me?, Kaling shares insightful, deeply personal stories about falling in love at work, seeking new friendships in lonely places, attempting to be the first person in history to lose weight without any behavior modification whatsoever, and believing that you have a place in Hollywood when you’re constantly reminded that no one looks like you. In “How to Look Spectacular: A Starlet’s Confessions,” Kaling gives her tongue-in-cheek secrets for surefire on-camera beauty, (“Your natural hair color may be appropriate for your skin tone, but this isn’t the land of appropriate–this is Hollywood, baby. Out here, a dark-skinned woman’s traditional hair color is honey blonde.”) “Player” tells the story of Kaling being seduced and dumped by a female friend in L.A. (“I had been replaced by a younger model. And now they had matching bangs.”) In “Unlikely Leading Lady,” she muses on America’s fixation with the weight of actresses, (“Most women we see onscreen are either so thin that they’re walking clavicles or so huge that their only scenes involve them breaking furniture.”) And in “Soup Snakes,” Kaling spills some secrets on her relationship with her ex-boyfriend and close friend, B.J. Novak (“I will freely admit: my relationship with B.J. Novak is weird as hell.”) Mindy turns the anxieties, the glamour, and the celebrations of her second coming-of-age into a laugh-out-loud funny collection of essays that anyone who’s ever been at a turning point in their life or career can relate to. And those who’ve never been at a turning point can skip to the parts where she talks about meeting Bradley Cooper.
When your forties are fading in the rear-view mirror, and your happily ever after wasn’t as long or as happy as you thought it would be. What then? Do you still have any dreams left to chase? Do you even want to? Chris’s happily ever after was more of a nightmare than a dream. But that was a long time ago. These days, she lives a full life. She dates sometimes. Just because she’s in her fifties doesn’t mean she’s forgotten how to have fun. But a love of her own? That might just be a dream too far. Seymour’s dreams came true when he married young and had a daughter. He doesn’t believe in dreams anymore. Since his wife died, he’s hidden himself in his work. He’s made more money than one man could ever need. He’s rebuilt the bridges he burned with his daughter. He’d even go as far as to say he’s content. But falling in love again? That’s not even a wish for him, let alone a dream. Until he meets Chris … Pick up your copy of this heart-warming romance today and you’ll laugh and cry as these two figure out whether old enough means wise enough to love again—or whether a happily ever after at their age is just a dream too far. This book is intended for readers aged 18+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Summer Lake Silver is a new series featuring couples in their fifties and older. Just because a few decades—or more—have skipped by since you were in your twenties it doesn’t mean you can’t find love, does it? Summer Lake Silver stories find happily ever afters for those who remember being thirty-something—vaguely. Like Some Old Country Song - Clay and Marianne A Dream Too Far - Seymour and Chris A Little Rain Must Fall - Ted and Audrey Where the Rainbow Ends - Diego and Izzy Silhouettes Shadows and Sunsets – Manny and Nina More Than Sometimes – Cal and Teresa Like a Soft Sweet Breeze - Russ and Alexandria When Words Are Not Enough – Adam and Evelyn Can’t Fight the Moonlight – Dalton and Taryn Meet Me Where the Stars Fall – Lucky and Dee Coming next: Walking on Sunshine - Damon and Jo Summer Lake Seasons A return to the wonderful small town so many readers have grown to love. Take These Broken Wings - Angel and Luke Too Much Love to Hide - Maria and Zack Sunshine Over Snow - Logan Roxy Chase the Blues Away - Ivan and Abbie Forever Takes a While - Colt and Cassie Love in Nashville Bring on the Night is the first in the new Love in Nashville series. Summer Lake Original Series Love Like You've Never Been Hurt - Emma and Jack Work Like You Don't Need the Money - Pete and Holly Dance Like Nobody's Watching - Missy and Dan Fly Like You've Never Been Grounded - Smoke and Laura Laugh Like You've Never Cried - Michael and Megan Sing Like Nobody's Listening - Kenzie and Chase Smile Like You Mean It - Gabe and Renée The Wedding Dance - Missy and Dan's Wedding Chasing Tomorrow - Ben's backstory with Charlotte Dream Like Nothing's Impossible - April and Eddie Ride Like You've Never Fallen - Nate and Lily Live Like There's No Tomorrow - Ben's story The Wedding Flight – Smoke and Laura’s Wedding Remington Ranch series Meet the sexy brothers of Remington Ranch! Just like in SJ's Summer Lake Romance series you can expect a story that is both sweet and steamy! Mason Shane Carter Beau Four Weddings and a Vendetta A Chance and a Hope series. These are NOT meant to be read as standalone stories and need to be read in order. Book 1: Chance Encounter Book 2: Finding Hope Book 3: Give Hope a Chance The Hamiltons Series This series follows the Hamilton family in California wine country. If you recognize the name Hamilton it’s because this is Smoke’s family who own one of the largest wine growing and distribution businesses in the country. In this set of connected stand-alone books you will meet Smoke’s brother and sister as well as a couple of cousins. Red Wine and Roses Champagne and daisies Marsala and Magnolias Prosecco and Peonies The Davenports Series The series featuring Hope’ Davenport's cousins, three sexy brothers, of the billionaire Davenport family. In their own words they are - the "Suit", the "Vet" and the "Geek." Oscar TJ Reid
Containing walks and detailed maps from throughout the city, Secret Stairs highlights the charms and quirks of a unique feature of the Los Angeles landscape, and chronicles the geographical, architectural, and historical aspects of the city’s staircases, as well as of the neighborhoods in which the steps are located. From strolling through the classic La Loma neighborhood in Pasadena to walking the Sunset Junction Loop in Silver Lake, to taking the Beachwood Canyon hike through “Hollywoodland” to enjoying the magnificent ocean views from the Castellammare district in Pacific Palisades, Secret Stairs takes you on a tour of the staircases all across the City of Angels. The circular walks, rated for duration and difficulty, deliver tales of historic homes and their fascinating inhabitants, bits of unusual local trivia, and stories of the neighborhoods surrounding the stairs. That’s where William Faulkner was living when he wrote the screenplay for To Have and Have Not; that house was designed by Neutra; over there is a Schindler; that’s where Woody Guthrie lived, where Anais Nin died, and where Thelma Todd was murdered . . . Despite the fact that one of these staircases starred in an Oscar-winning short film—Laurel and Hardy’s The Music Box, from 1932—these civic treasures have been virtually unknown to most of the city’s residents and visitors. Now, Secret Stairs puts these hidden stairways back on the map, while introducing urban hikers to exciting new “trails” all around the city of Los Angeles.
