Showing results by narrator "Jessica Almasy" in All Categories

The Kaufmans have always considered themselves a normal, happy family. Curtis is a physics teacher at a local high school. His wife, Kathleen, restores furniture for upscale boutiques. Daniel is away at college on a prestigious music scholarship, and 12-year-old Olivia is a happy-go-lucky kid whose biggest concern is passing her next math test. And then comes the middle-of-the-night phone call that changes everything.

Winners of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, O. Henry Award and Edgar Awards, the 19 writers in this 2005 edition are not just considered some of the best Southern writers, but among the best American writers period. With works by such writers as Dennis Lehane, Moira Crone, Robert Olen Butler, Cary Holladay, Tom Franklin, and Rebecca Soppe, this collection provides an electrifying current of deep, dark subjects set in the brutal, but charming south.

The Nihil storm has raged through the galaxy, leaving chaos and grief in its wake. Few of its raiders are as vicious as the Tempest Runner Lourna Dee. She stays one step ahead of the Jedi Order at the helm of a vessel named after one of the deadliest monsters in the galaxy: the Lourna Dee. But no one can outrun the defenders of the High Republic forever.

Hailey Taylor's heart has always belonged to Mason Cahill, but one secret has changed everything. Things on the baseball field come easy for Mason Cahill. Why can’t the rest of his life be simple? Mason's finally admitted he wants the one girl he can be himself around, but one secret destroyed that. Their love isn't sweet and simple. It's hot, loud, and messy. But now, when he's finally all in, she’s folded. Sparks fly. Tempers flare. Hearts shatter. One thing is certain…everything has changed.

Humans live, fall in love, and return to the dirt from which they came, but for Roseline Enescue, time stands still. Vladimir continues in his ruthless pursuit to destroy her spirit. Plagued by the sinister whispers of his brother, Lucian, her husband turns to new methods of torture that leave Roseline on the brink of insanity. As rumors spread among the humans of vile monsters that inhabit Castle Bran, giving way to wild legend and myth, she is forced to fight alongside the family she despises in order to survive.

With the first ice - a skim on a sheep pail so thin it breaks when touched - one family's winter begins in earnest. Next comes ice like panes of glass. And eventually, skating ice! Take a literary skate over field ice and streambed, through sleeping orchards and beyond. The first ice, the second ice, the third ice...perfect ice...the last ice.... Twelve kinds of ice are carved into twenty nostalgic vignettes, illustrated in elegantly scratched detail by the award-winning Barbara McClintock.

Jaylinn McCormick is determined to forget that one terrifying night which left her feeling broken and tainted. There is one person who can make her whole again - but he is hell bent on keeping her at arm's length. She has loved him her entire life but can she wait for him to step up to the plate? Cooper Cahill has loved Jaylinn for years. He wants nothing more than to put all her pieces back together but he deems himself unworthy. Choosing between his baseball career and Jaylinn has him feeling lost.

Ruby dreams of escaping the Congregation. Escape from slaver Darwin West and his cruel Overseers. Escape from struggling to gather the life-prolonging Water that keeps the Congregants alive--and Darwin rich. Escape from her certain, dreary existence, living as if it's still the early 1800s, when the Congregation was first enslaved. But if Ruby leaves, the Congregation will die without the secret ingredient to the Water: her blood.

Marla Mason is the chief sorcerer of Felport, a woman who's tangled with gods and monsters and come out on top (if a bit damaged in the process). Bone Shop tells the story of Marla's evolution from runaway to sorcerer's apprentice to mercenary magician and beyond. Fans of the urban fantasy series from Bantam Spectra that began with Blood Engines will find surprising secrets revealed about Marla's past, and new listeners can get to know the character from the very beginning.

What do you do when your marriage is so unhappy that you begin to fantasize about your husband’s funeral? That’s how bad it got for Alisa Bowman.... So she launched a last-ditch effort to save her marriage. Project: Happily Ever After is her fearlessly honest and humorous account of how she went from being a "divorce daydreamer" to renewing her wedding vows - and all of the steps in between.

Prom fever has infected L.A. - especially Cindy's two annoying stepsisters, and her overly Botoxed stepmother. Cindy seems to be the only one immune to it all. But her anti-prom letter in the school newspaper does more to turn Cindy into Queen of the Freaks than close the gap between the popular kids and the rest of the students.

After finally learning who was behind her mother's death, Calla still doesn't understand why it happened. Somewhere out there, someone seems to share the powerful psychic abilities that allow Calla to see not only into the past, but to the Other Side...someone who apparently doesn't want to be found.

As chief sorcerer of Felport, Marla Mason thought she'd faced every kind of evil the magical world had to offer. But she's never faced a killer like this. He's dark, glib, handsome as the devil - and exactly who he says he is. Death - in the flesh. He's arrived in Felport with a posse composed of a half-insane necromancer and the reanimated corpse of John Wilkes Booth, and he isn't leaving until he gets what he came for. Only Marla is crazy enough to tell Death to go back to Hell.

Sophie Lawson may be a mere human with no special abilities except a strong immunity to magic. But the havoc she's wreaked on the supernaturals who come up against the Underworld Detection Agency have earned her plenty of enemies. Still, a girl can't freak out every time a horribly barbecued corpse is found with her business card in its hand. Or see a sudden glut of earthquakes, wildfires and three-headed dogs as just another day in California.

Changers Book One: Drew opens on the eve of Ethan Miller's freshman year of high school in a brand-new town. He's finally sporting a haircut he doesn't hate, has grown two inches since middle school, and can't wait to try out for the soccer team. At last, everything is looking up in life. Until the next morning. When Ethan awakens as a girl. Ethan is a Changer, a little-known, ancient race of humans who live out each of their four years of high school as a different person.

Jaylinn McCormick finally found the man who makes her life complete. After putting the most terrifying night of her life behind her, she's moving on. Suddenly, unexpected life-altering events have Jaylinn spiraling in an unknown direction. Will she be able to survive? Cooper Cahill finally found a balance in his life. He's got the girl he always loved, business is thriving, and his baseball career is grand slamming down a new path. One phone call threatens to destroy his perfect life.

Yum-Yum is an adorable shih tzu and one of Zoe’s favorite clients. When Zoe and Yum-Yum visit a ward of cancer patients, she is amazed by how much joy the tiny dog can spread in an instant. But then Yum-Yum is diagnosed with cancer himself. How can Zoe help the little dog pull through?

After a checkered career as a magical mercenary, ruler of a city, occult detective, freelance monster-hunter, and part-time demigod, Marla Mason has ascended fully to godhood, and now rules the underworld alone. Before she can retire to an eternity overseeing the afterlife, though, she has a couple of loose ends to tie up. An old associate has called in a favor and wants Marla's help to defeat an alien infestation that could transform the world into an inhospitable wasteland.

Tom DeMille lives his life exactly as he pleases - always alone. In fact, he's got that motto tattooed in Greek on his arm. But when Tom is suddenly saddled with guardianship of his 12-year-old niece, he'll lose more than his freedom if he can't figure out how to take care of her. Then an alluring young woman with pink hair and a sassy mouth shows up at his door, and he agrees to do the unthinkable - photograph a wedding in exchange for some help with his niece.

During the long, cold winter of 1692, seven young ladies from Salem, Massachusetts, begin to display disturbing symptoms. They’re convulsing, contorting, cowering, and croaking strange sounds. Finding no help from medical books, the village doctor declares them bewitched. Having already triggered more than 60,000 executions in Europe, the fear of witchcraft begins its work - even among sensible, down-to-earth New Englanders. And before it’s all over, 141 people are arrested - 19 women are hanged, one man is crushed to death, and four others die in jail.