After his girlfriend’s death, 30-something-year-old Thymothy X Exler moves back home with his mother, Suzanne, to get stability and then changes his name to Thyme. While out walking, Thyme witnesses a tragedy that changes the direction of his life. Meanwhile, Suzanne is stalked and threatened by a man she dated briefly, and Thyme takes matters into his own hands, with kitchen utensils. Soon, the man begins appearing in the lives of Thyme’s friends with disturbing consequences. Thyme begins to hear the jingle of his dog’s collar occasionally, but his dog died years ago. And then Chastity disrupts things even more.
Before I reached the stairwell, I saw something out of the corner of my eye. A strange and beautiful man had dropped to his knees in front of me, unencumbered, unembarrassed. I stopped short. He was slender, almost Asiatic looking, wearing baggy combat trousers and a T-shirt. He was flirting, and then he was laughing at my reaction. There was not much for me to do but also smile... Janine and Bruno first fell in love as young reporters in the besieged city of Sarajevo. Years later - after endless phone calls, much of what the French call malentendu, secret trysts in foreign cities, numerous break-ups, three miscarriages, countless stories of rebel armies and a dozen wars that had passed between them - they arrive in Paris one rainy January to begin a new life together. The remnants of their separate lives, now left behind, are tentatively unpacked into their shared apartment on the Right Bank: Bruno's heavy blanket from Ethiopia, a set of long feathered arrows from Brazil, an ash tray stolen from a hotel in Algeria, and Janine's flak-jacket and canvas boots, still full of sand from the Western Desert in Iraq. But having met in another lifetime - in another world - ordinary, civilian life doesn't come easily. War has become part of them: it had brought them together, and, though both are damaged by it, neither can quite leave it behind. And the difficult journey that follows, through their mix of joy and terror at becoming parents, Bruno's battle with post-traumatic stress and addiction, and Janine's determination to make France her home, leads to an understanding of the truth that people who deeply love each other cannot always live together. A searing, profoundly moving love letter, beautifully written, Ghosts by Daylight is a powerfully raw portrait of marriage and motherhood in the aftermath of war.
Twelve-year-old Ann Jones is unhappy with her life. She thinks her best friend has deserted her for the new girl in town. Then while Ann is at the cave on the mountain, the town and surrounding area are hit by an earthquake. Ann is at ground zero. Immediately after the quake, strange things begin to happen to her. She has the sensation she is being watched, hears voices in her head and sees ghosts. Ann begins to have headaches, as the spirit world unleashes a host of spirits and supernatural beings—some for good and some evil. Others don’t see or feel what Ann does, and the one person she confides in doesn’t believe her. It’s no wonder Ann doubts her sanity. Then Ann meets Melisse, the ghost of a girl her age, who befriends but also asks her to do something she is afraid to do. Ann is warned that bad things will happen if she doesn’t do what Melisse asks. Can Ann do what she is asked to do? Will anyone ever believe her? Will she succeed in her mission? Will she ever be the person she was again?
WINNER OF THE BIG RED READ PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION IN 2013. Cathryn Kemp was a successful travel journalist who was struck down by a life-threatening illness, pancreatitis. After four years of operations and mis-diagnoses she left hospital with a repeat prescription for fentanyl, a painkiller 100 times stronger than heroin. Within two years she was taking more than ten times the NHS maximum, all on prescription. Her family struggled to understand; her boyfriend left her, she hit rock bottom. Discovering she had only six months to live if she didn't give up the drugs she sold everything she owned and checked into rehab. In the addiction treatment centre she was told that she was unlikely to recover from 'the highest level of opiate-abuse in the clinic's history'. To everyone's amazement, she proved them wrong. This is an extraordinarily poignant, vivid and honest memoir. Based on the twenty-four diaries that the author kept during this period, we travel with Cathryn through her hospital agony, descend with her into the hell of addiction and cheer her as she pulls herself out and upwards. It is a love story, a horror story, a survival story, and one that shows only too clearly the very real dangers of the over-prescription of painkillers and tranquillisers. There is also a resource section for sufferers and their loved ones.
Reveals changing perceptions of ghosts at different social levels from the Reformation through to the twentieth century in Britain and America. This five-volume set focuses on the key published debates that emerged in each century, and illustrates the range of literary formats that reported or discussed ghosts.
WHEN VARIANT SQUAD Captain Joe Borland works up the nerve to take care of some long-overdue business, he stumbles upon the terrifying shape of things to come. Dreams and reality collide in the shadow of the Variant Effect. Joe Borland returns in PAINKILLER, a gut-wrenching novella of grisly horror that takes place between the events in The Variant Effect books: SKIN EATERS and GREENMOURNING. It's been twenty years since Borland battled the Variant Effect, and twenty since he let his partner get skinned alive. Now both of them are being ordered back into action to meet the new threat.
2 Heydt Howard Gordon Wells was well acquainted with pain and suffered from a wide variety of unwelcome ailments in diverse regions of his body--until the chance purchase of a mysterious urn gave him the unique and supernatural ability to make his wishes come true. It seemed like a foolproof opportunity to rid himself of every bellyache and back spasm. Things are not so simple, though. Every pain has a cause and, quite often, a purpose. And every wish has side effects and unforeseen consequences. Soon, Howard learns to appreciate the truth of the old adage, "Be careful what you wish for."
Self made business woman, Cean Sullivan was delighted to live in the house she was clearing for racecar driver Ty Moore in Tama, North Carolina. Along with her is her little dog Lily and always prepared for anything out of the norm, including ghostly apparitions. Her late grand mothers bible helps keep them at bay. Why not she had two of them with her at any given time. One of them her own mother Helen. What surprised her was the house owned by NASCAR driver Ty Moore was going to be used as a rental. Along with the local agent, Tally Rodgers, Cean discovers there's more to the house than just clutter. When a dark specter attacks her Cean is determined to rid the house of it until the late previous owner Aunt Clara Jenkins arrives in a golden shower. Between going to races with Ty, along with Tally as his Red Ladies and clearing the house her mother befriends Aunt Clara. Not until Cean is forced to bring in a professional ghost consultant that she learns just what kind of formidable specter they had going.
A collection of murder, mystery, and history, Gourmet Ghosts 2 is the latest guide to dozens of haunted and blood-stained bars, restaurants, and hotels in Los Angeles. Featuring more unpublished stories and bizarre events from the city's dark past, this volume scours the newspaper archives to find out the truth behind the tales.
