Showing titles in Psychological

Raised in a magnificent Charleston house, Jessie Roland wants for nothing. But as she grows into young adulthood, all she feels is loss and a desperate need to break free from the stifling possessiveness of her parents. Somewhere, in the deepest part of herself, Jessie believes that the world she has always lived in is not the one she came from...or belongs in. Now, at 19, she has escaped to Washington, DC, where no one knows her, and where she is swept into a whirlwind marriage to a Texas senator's son.

Ten years have passed since Muriel Axon was locked away for society's protection, but psychiatric confinement has only increased her malice and ingenuity. At last free, she sets into motion an intricate plan to exact revenge on those who had her put away. Her former social worker, Isabel, and her old neighbors have moved on, but Muriel, with her talent for disguise, will infiltrate their homes and manipulate their lives, until all her enemies are brought together for a gruesome finale.

Anne Tyler gives us a wise, haunting, and deeply moving new novel in which she explores how a middle-aged man, torn apart by the death of his wife, is gradually restored by her frequent appearances: in their house, on the roadway, in the market. Gradually he discovers, as he works in the family's vanity-publishing business, turning out titles that presume to guide beginners through the trials of life, that maybe for this beginner there is a way of saying goodbye.

La potenza narrativa di Silvia Avallone torna con una storia di condanna e salvezza, scandagliando le profondità di una storia d'amore tra due solitudini che sa farsi portatrice di una promessa, seppur remota, di redenzione. Un romanzo potente e umano che riafferma come la luce più pura possa crescere anche al centro di un abisso di disperazione. Il giorno in cui Bruno assiste al misterioso arrivo di Emilia nel borgo della piccola comunità montana di Sassaia non sa ancora che quell'evento è destinato a stravolgere, di lì a poco, la sua esistenza.

Inextricably linked with the fatwa called against its author in the wake of the novel’s publication, The Satanic Verses is, beyond that, a rich showcase for Salman Rushdie’s comic sensibilities, cultural observations, and unparalleled mastery of language. The book begins with two Indians plummeting from the sky after the explosion of their airliner, and proceeds through a series of metamorphoses, dreams and revelations.

In 2002, five women are discovered barbarously murdered in Sierra Leone. Reuters Africa correspondent Connie Burns suspects a British mercenary: a man who seems to turn up in every war-torn corner of Africa, whose reputation for violence and brutality is well-founded and widely known. Connie's suspicions that he's using the chaos of war to act out sadistic, misogynistic fantasies fall on deaf ears -- but she's determined to expose him and his secret.

The New York Times best-selling author of Firestorm, Iris Johansen, returns with a psychological thriller so terrifying, so relentlessly paced, it won't leave you time to catch your breath before the next shock comes. A forensic sculptor is locked in a deadly duel with a serial killer determined to destroy her, one life at a time.

This masterful National Book Award winner explores the shattering effects of war on the human mind. Growing up, Birdy dreams of flying like a bird and shares these fantasies with his best friend Al. Years later, World War II sends both men to hospitals - Al for physical wounds and Birdy for psychological trauma. When Birdy falls into a catatonic state, it is Al who tries to pull him out.

When Jane, an aspiring writer, meets filmmaker John Bridges, they both want the same things: to be in love, to live a successful, creative life, and to be happy. When they marry, Jane believes she has found everything she was looking for, including—a few years later—all the attendant joys and labors of motherhood. But it’s not long until Jane finds herself subsumed by John’s ambitions, whims, and ego; in short, she becomes a wife.

Dark men. They are intriguing, and charming, and powerful. They are changing the world. They are changing themselves. They are playing with lust, and love, and fear, and loathing. Addicted to each other, to their secret, to the seduction, to the sex. It’s a crash in the making. And yes, it’s on purpose. These men are dark. And this is the story of how Nova Ryan loves them.

This was the late John Updike's first collection of new short fiction since the year 2000. My Father's Tears finds the author in a valedictory mood, as he mingles narratives of his native Pennsylvania with stories of New England suburbia and of foreign travel. American experience from the Depression to the aftermath of 9/11 finds reflection in these glittering pieces of observation, remembrance, and imagination.

In the summer of 1959 Stella Raphael joins her psychiatrist husband, Max, at his new posting - a maximum-security hospital for the criminally insane. Stella soon falls under the spell of Edgar Stark, a brilliant sculptor who has been confined to the hospital for murdering his wife in a psychotic rage. But Stella's knowledge of Edgar's crime is no hindrance to the volcanic attraction that ensues -a passion that will consume Stella's sanity and destroy her and the lives of those around her.

"Chess Story," also known as "The Royal Game," is Stefan Zweig's compelling novella that unfolds on a passenger steamer. It narrates the psychological duel between Mirko Czentovic, a chess champion with a mysterious past, and Dr. B, a reclusive genius. Set against the backdrop of World War II, the story explores themes of isolation, obsession, and the struggle for intellectual sanity.

Julie Prentice and her family move across the country to the idyllic Mount Adams district of Cincinnati, hoping to evade the stalker who's been terrorizing them ever since the publication of her bestselling novel, The Murder Game. Since Julie doesn't know anyone in her new town, when she meets her neighbor John Dunbar, their instant connection brings measured hope for a new beginning. But she never imagines that a simple, benign conversation with him could set her life spinning so far off course.

Katrina Kim may be broke, the black sheep of her family, and slightly unhinged, but she isn’t a stalker. Her obsession with her co-worker, Kurt, is just one of many coping mechanisms—like her constant shape and number rituals, or the way scenes from her favorite children’s book bleed into her vision whenever she feels anxious. But when Katrina finds a cryptic message from Kurt implying he’s aware of her surveillance, her tenuous hold on a normal life crumbles. Driven by compulsion, she makes a midnight visit to the Cayatoga Bridge—just in time to witness Kurt’s suicide.

As the Chief of Rheumatology at Columbia Presbyterian, Dr. Paul Allen's specialty is diagnosing patients with conflicting symptoms, patients other doctors have given up on. He lives a contented life in Westport with his second wife and their twin sons - hard won after a failed marriage earlier in his career that produced a son named Daniel.

Richard returns to Maui where he reunites with Johnathan and Mamma Lila. Once again, he finds their wisdom intellectually contradictory, but most intriguing. In Quest of the Pearl, like Second Chance, is a simply told, very moving story bringing the listener into a world of soft tropical beauty, where undiscovered depths of feeling are waiting to be discovered.

Maddie and Kiara have been best friends since they met on their first day at university. They have always shared everything with each other--everything except one big secret, which Kiara knows would tear them apart…. When the police knock on Maddie’s front door as she and husband Nick are getting ready for the morning school run, she’s not expecting to hear what they have to tell her. Kiara is dead.

The community along Oregon’s Deschutes River is one of successful careers and perfect families. For years, up-and-comers Liz and Owen have admired their good friends and neighbors, Carole and David. They appear to have it all - security, happiness, and a beautiful young son, Charlie. Then Charlie vanishes without a trace, and all that seemed safe is shattered by a tragedy that is incomprehensible - except to Liz.

Kay Lansing grew up the daughter of the landscaper to the wealthy and powerful Carrington family. One day, accompanying her father to work, six-year-old Kay overhears a quarrel between a man and a woman that ends with the man's caustic response: "I heard that song before." That same evening, young Peter Carrington drives the 19-year-old daughter of neighbors home from a formal dinner dance at the Carrington estate, but she is not in her room the next morning and is never seen or heard from again.