Showing results by narrator "Holly Adams" in All Categories

She must return to the place that twice brought her shame. She’ll have one final chance to save someone else. Tennessee, 1982. Wildflower McAllister thought she’d put the past behind her. But when she learns her mother is dying, she digs deep and returns to the small mountain town that stole her innocence and cast her out. And she has no choice but to pull her thirteen-year-old granddaughter Daisy right back into the ghosts of her painful history.

This delightful collection of short stories from acclaimed writer Susan Gabriel (The Secret Sense of Wildflower, a Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2012 and an Amazon number one best seller) is rich in humor as well as mystery and meaning. Whether white or black, living or dead, down home country or upscale urban, Gabriel's characters are quirky, poignant, and deep.

Published in 1909, this classic romance is set in Ithaca, New York, the author's life-long home. Living in a squatters shanty, shunned by the 'upstanding' folk of Ithaca, Tessibel Skinner is nonetheless shocked when her father, a fisherman, is accused of murder. Barefoot, beautiful, and innocent, Tess sets out to clear his name, enduring hardship and narrowly escaping the viscous cruelty of those who would harm her.

More an origin story than a traditional novel, Jack July's Amy Lynn follows the coming-of-age of a charming little Southern girl. Raised in a family of bootleggers and scoundrels, the motherless Amy is adopted by her Aunt Carla Jo, who teaches her everything about being a woman. A triumvirate of male Southern characters teach her other lessons: How to survive, how to live off the land, and how to be a winner. By the time Amy enlists in the United States Navy, she is the sort of heroic figure who commands respect and surprises everyone with her strength, skills, and heart.

Set in 1940s Appalachia, The Secret Sense of Wildflower tells the story of Louisa May "Wildflower" McAllister whose life has been shaped around the recent death of her beloved father in a sawmill accident. While her mother hardens in her grief, Wildflower and her three sisters must cope with their loss themselves, as well as with the demands of daily survival. Despite these hardships, Wildflower has a resilience that is forged with humor, a love of the land, and an endless supply of questions to God.

Sheriff Jake Conrad knew two things. Either the beautiful woman with the killer body and mule-headed nature had to leave town, or he was about to get his heart broken. Occupied with chasing some shifty drug traffickers, he had no time for an affair, and something warned him that with Christine Harper, one night would never be enough. But when Chris gets caught up in the middle of his investigation, he has little doubt what the outcome will be.

When a black boy named Paris saves Trudy from being crushed by a runaway Sunbeam Bread truck, they become friends. Navigating a multi-racial friendship in 1964 is no easy thing, however. The racism they encounter inspires them to go on an audacious adventure: to take down the Confederate flag that flies atop the South Carolina State House. And they can't do it without the help of Trudy's grandmother, Ida.

Bailey Reynolds never thought she would never in her life have to choose between someone that will give her everything she wants and someone that makes her feel like she is everything in his life. How does this southern spitfire choose between what her heart wants versus what her head tells her she wants?

Welcome to Perky's Books & Gifts where gardening books blossom into bouquets, cookbooks sizzle with succulent juices, and military history books can be lethal. Don't mind the mutilated body behind the werewolf display, or the fact that the cafe manager is an egregore; Frankenstein was one, too. The story of Perky's Books & Gifts begins with murder and ends with true love. It is told by Madison, Perky's night manager. She must band with her quirky (maybe just plain crazy) staff to figure out just what is making the books spring to life and terrorize the store.

"Wildflower" McAllister's daughter, Lily, now 14, struggles with her mother's reluctance to tell her who her father is. When a stranger appears on the family doorstep, drunk and evoking ghosts from the past, it threatens to break the close-knit McAllister family apart. Meanwhile, Wildflower has a deep secret of her own. When Lily discovers it by accident, it changes everything she thought she knew about her mother. The events that follow silence the singing she dreamed of sharing with the world.

A charming but ineffective prince takes the road less travelled after a hunt, setting in motion events that result in him losing his wife and his kingdom of Grunewald in under a week. The plot is thick with disreputable characters (even the prince) as well as court intrigue, treachery, and deceit...but in the hands of master storyteller Robert Louis Stevenson, these larger-than-life characters are delightful, and the almost-serious events become part of a lighthearted and sweet fairy tale complete with a happy ending.

With the new year approaching, hospital chaplain Lindsay Harding heads for a much-needed break in the peaceful resort town of Duck on North Carolina's outer banks. Her plan to attend the wedding of her friend, Anna, runs aground when a boatload of trouble washes ashore, and as the old year ticks down, the body count goes up. Thrust into the path of an increasingly desperate killer, Lindsay must uncover a sinister secret before she winds up swimming with the fishes.

Tess Porter set out across the country to start a new life with her estranged father on the dangerous Colorado Frontier. When she arrives in Denver City to a tragedy, she struggles to keep her dream alive and get the justice she so desperately needs. Former outlaw turned rancher, Ian Bidwell, spent most of his life ransacking the dreams of others, until he met Christ. He severs ties from his overbearing uncle, a man desperate for Tess's land, and offers to help her.

Eighty-year-old Southern aristocrat Iris Temple's health may be failing, but her wit is as sharp as ever. Before she joins her ancestral ghosts, she must pick an heir to take over her sprawling estate—and the book of secrets that's kept her family in power for generations. But between her scheming son, her estranged daughter who abandoned Savannah years ago, and her illegitimate half sister, she's working with slim pickings.

Perfumer Amanda Whitfield no longer sees the science geek when she looks in her mirror - thanks to the makeover her best friend gave her - but she still feels like that geeky girl inside. To hook a man, Amanda, following her best friend's advice, plans to portray an empty-headed hottie whose bra size is a bigger number than her IQ. She'll do whatever it takes to get a date for her cousin's wedding because there's no way she'll attend what is supposed to be the "wedding of the year" without a man on her arm.

Twenty years in the future is five-hundred years in the past. It is just two decades after the worldwide societal collapse and the Vallenses, an Amish-like "plain people" living and surviving in what was once Central Texas, are under attack by the King of Aztlan and his armies. The pacifistic Vallenses are defended by the shadowy Ghost Militia and their inspiring leader Phillip, a militant freeman who wages a guerrilla war with Aztlan.

When a down-on-its-luck mining town makes Darcy Duncan marshal after she shoots a bank robber, she puts every effort into helping the town. Her accident-prone nature, however, makes the task difficult as well as throws her into the arms of an unsuspecting drifter. All Gil Halsey wants is to bring back the boss's son and secure the foreman job on a large cattle ranch. He's been running from his past and has finally found a place to settle. That is until a scrawny, greenhorn marshal turns out to be an enticing, young woman who lures him from his path.

Track coach Andrea O'Connor fumed at the audacity of Ian Powers, the very attractive father of one of her students. He had offered to buy school equipment only if Andrea agreed to train him for a half-marathon. Well, train him, she would. And not just in running. As a widower with a high-powered job, Ian needed some instruction in being a father to an active teenage daughter. Yet as this overbearing man opened up, Andrea found herself learning lessons - in loving.

Every woman makes mistakes. Meet Stormy Clarkson, haunted by the three whoppers she made that changed her life forever. She keeps her distance from men, but now she's crushing on totally gorgeous Sean Butler, owner of Sierra Verde Winery. Sean's been after her for six months, but she's resisted every advance. She can't risk another mistake, and Sean scares her because of the way he makes her feel.

Joelle Daughtry has a secret. By day, the impoverished Southern belle has been helping her sisters to turn the run-down family plantation into a resort hotel after the close of the Civil War. But by night and under a male pseudonym, she has been penning articles for the local paper in support of constructing a school for former slaves. With the Mississippi arm of the Ku Klux Klan gaining power and prestige, Joelle knows she is playing a dangerous game. Loyalties shift when Schuyler Beaumont, childhood enemy, takes over his assassinated father's candidacy for state office.