Showing results by narrator "Luci Christian Bell" in All Categories

I breathed in and out for a few seconds as I waited at the end of the aisle. It felt like I was standing overlooking the edge of a cliff, and the minute I saw my future wife, I was going to freefall. The music started. Shit, I was seriously going to pass out. People stood; Demetri nodded his head and patted me on the back. And then I saw her. It was like seeing her for the first time all over again. Memories of meeting her that first day of school had me grinning from ear to ear.

Imagine a United States in which registries and detainment camps for Muslim-Americans are a reality. Fifteen-year-old Sarah-Mary Williams of Hannibal, Missouri, lives in this world, and though she has strong opinions on almost everything, she isn't concerned with the internments because she doesn't know any Muslims. She assumes that everything she reads and sees in the news is true and that these plans are better for everyone's safety.

This is not a simple story. This is not even just one story. There’s a boy, and there’s a girl. But there’s so much more than that. I was going home. Not forever; only long enough to watch my eternally irresponsible father marry a girl who happened to be my childhood enemy. There were no plans to embark on some crazy sex odyssey with a wild 19-year old baseball player. Easton Malone is insufferable, crude, and far too close. The hot, reckless days we shared should never have happened. I would forget him.

Montana, AD 2022. Sixteen-year-old Molly Wilder discovers a mysterious fossil while on a summer internship. The fossil has a large wing structure, horned skull, and black bones. Neither famed fossil-hunter Derek Farnsworth nor renowned paleontologist Dr. Sean Oliphant can place it in a recognized dinosaur family.

Against the backdrop of the high-stakes and intensely competitive equestrian sport of show jumping, Finny, a fifteen-year-old girl in California, adopts an emaciated, untrained horse without her parents' knowledge. Soon after adopting Sky, Finny meets Joe, a sixteen-year-old, who has run away from his cruel uncle in Montana.

What would you do if you were born to be a predator? Would you fight your natural instincts or give in to your nature? Eden is a soul eater closing in on her awakening. Her family has convinced her that soon she will have to take a life in order to save her own. It’s a decision Eden doesn’t want to deal with even as her hunger for souls grows stronger every day. To complicate her impossible position, new guy in school Noah Valois’ determination to befriend her puts Eden in touch with a humanity she’s never known. Addicted to his company, his friendship and affection, she becomes more and more terrified that giving into her hunger will mean losing him forever.…

Chock-full of essays and true tales by some of America's most famous authors and thought leaders, these great listens inspire, uplift, open the door to new possibilities, and connect us emotionally. Organized around timeless American values - joy, miracles, giving, gratitude, holidays, and healing - listeners will laugh, cry, cheer, sigh, and renew their faith as they enjoy the powerful impact of a well-told story.

Astrid Llewelyn is now a fully trained unicorn hunter, but she can't solve all her problems with just a bow and arrow. Her boyfriend, Giovanni, has decided to leave Rome, the Cloisters is in dire financial straits, her best friend's powers seem to be mysteriously disintegrating, and Astrid can't help but feel that her hopes of becoming a scientist are nothing but impossible dreams. So when she's given the opportunity to leave the Cloisters and put her skills to use as part of a scientific quest to discover the Remedy, Astrid leaps at the chance.

Eden’s life has taken a turn she would never have imagined. She’s gone from soul eater to warrior, left behind a family she was ashamed of, and moved in with one she admires. She has a purpose, a future, and…she has Noah. Life should be good. But…the most fervent and powerful soul eaters are determined to take down the Ankh and Eden is the key to the destruction of the warrior race. Moreover, a shadowed enemy is still after Eden, and the mortal Warriors of Neith have chosen the worst time imaginable to start an uprising. With an enemy in every corner the problems before her are overwhelming.

Isabel Acre's journey through life has taken her from the Australian outback via the beds and alleys of Fleet Street and she seamier side of Washington high life to a comfortable home in London, a reputation as a serious journalist, and a husband in the new chore-sharing, child-reading mould. Suddenly, however, the past which Isabel had thought safely behind her becomes the sources of actual physical danger. With frightening ease, the worlds of political intrigue and murderous conspiracy intrude into the coziness of her domestic life. Whom can she trust? Man?

Astrid Llewelyn has always scoffed at her eccentric mother's stories about killer unicorns. But when one attacks her boyfriend - ruining any chance of him taking her to prom - Astrid finds herself headed to Rome to train as a unicorn hunter at the ancient Cloisters the hunters have used for centuries. However, all is not what it seems at the Cloisters. Outside, unicorns wait to attack.

Whitney has been in so many foster homes that she can give a complete rundown on the most common varieties of foster parents - from the look-on-the-bright-side types to those unfortunate examples of pure evil. But one thing she doesn't know much about is trees. This means heading for Foster Home number 12 (which is all the way at the top of the map of California, where there looks to be nothing but trees) has Whitney feeling a little nervous. She is pretty sure that the middle of nowhere is going to be just one more place where a hyper, loud-mouthed kid who is messy and small for her age won't be welcome for long.

The first time I ever saw Smoky, she was on fire. My three children and I had arrived at the dump outside our Arizona desert town to throw out the weekly trash. As we approached the pit, which was smoldering, we heard the most mournful cries of a cat entombed in the smoking rubble.

Dani was born with her heart on the wrong side of her body. In her 15 years of life, she’s had more doctor’s appointments, X-rays, and tests, and eaten more green hospital Jell-O than she cares to think about. Fourteen-year-old Amanda is a competitive gymnast, her body a small package of sleek muscles, in perfect health. The two girls don’t know each other, don’t go to the same school, don’t have any friends in common. But their lives are about to collide. Acclaimed author Jill Wolfson tackles this fascinating story with her trademark honesty and wit.

All Eden wants is redemption...but the road to redemption is never an easy one. Travelling to Scotland to find her mother’s bloodline, Eden is soon embroiled in the politics and training of the Scottish Warriors of Neith. It is a world where some stand with open arms ready to welcome her as family, while others keep a wary distance, conspiring against her. Through it all Eden learns of love, friendship, and what it means to be a warrior. Her future has promise...that is until a man she thought was forever gone from her life returns to threaten it all. When the one person Eden loves above all else is endangered, she will have to make a choice. Him...or her?

Adele Bishop stares in disbelief as the tall, imposing figure of Reno Gold steps off the train. Her mail-order husband is no stranger, but the man who gave her a delicious taste of his wild streak years ago - when she was too young to know how to handle him. Now he’s here, foiling her plan to turn the tables on the men of Whistle Stop, who order their brides as if they were commodities. Adele has no thought of following through on marriage, and every intention of sending the devilishly irritating Reno on his drifting way.

Once in a while, a first novel arrives like a bolt of lightning, commanding attention with an explosion of power, grace, and light. Flying in Place is such a book. As unflinching as The Lovely Bones, as startling as Beloved, it is a work to bear witness - with bravery and compassion - for the experience of millions of readers and their loved ones. Emma is 12, a perfectly normal girl, in a perfectly normal home. With a perfectly normal father...who comes into her bedroom every night in the hours before dawn. Emma will do anything to escape.

Ruben Crosscroft is not your typical butler, a proper old gent in black tails. The awesome Aussie arrives sporting athletic shorts and a T-shirt. Blue-eyed, virile, tanned - he is no sexless wooden servant.... Which comes as a shock to divorcee Blaire Thomlin, who'd won Ruben's services in a contest for two whole weekends. Having a man around the house again made Blaire nervous, but Ruben cooks, cleans, and caters to Blaire's ever desire...including a few not in his job description. He turns Blaire's life around and makes her start to believe in love once more. Until ugly rumors surface about his past....

He swept into Lily Meeker’s sheltered world on a chill wind in a torrential rainstorm—Griffon Goforth, the dark, enigmatic clairvoyant Lily’s family had hired to locate her missing cousin. With ice-blue eyes and arms as warm as an Ozark sunset, the handsome stranger mesmerizes the lonely dark-haired beauty, setting free the sensuous, secret longings buried deep in her heart. True, she believes him a charlatan, but Lily is powerless to resist the searing heat of Griffon’s desire—and she is further enthralled as his touch awakens her own psychic gifts…and a love that dared live only in her dreams.

In a world shrouded by soot and smoke, young Makarria has literally been forbidden to dream.… Legend has foretold the demise of Emperor Thedric Guderian at the hands of a sorceress with royal blood, and the Emperor has made it his legacy to stamp out all magic from the Sargothian Empire in favor of primitive coal fired smelters and steam-powered machines. When Guderian’s minions discover a Dreamwielder on a seaside farmstead, a chain of events forces Guderian’s new threat - the young Makarria - to flee from her home and embark upon an epic journey.