Showing results by narrator "Brittany Pressley" in All Categories

Hannah and Finn have spent every Christmas together since college. Neither has anywhere else to go—Hannah’s parents died, and Finn’s disowned him when he came out. Their tradition of offbeat holiday adventures only grows more outrageous with time. When the pair starts their adult lives in New York City, they add stylish Priya and mysterious Theo to the group, solidifying a found family and sense of belonging they’ve always craved.

Liv Bakersfield is used to living her life in “shoulds.” Be fit. Be financially responsible. Be your best self. An overworked graphic designer, she’s stretched so thin that she’s about to miss yet another vacation with her beloved group of college friends. But when Liv finally decides to start saying no, it feels good…good enough to leap straight into quitting her job and hopping on a plane to join them in South Africa.

Kat MacTaggart is a girl who has a plan for everything - including her holiday ski trip to Monterra with her best friend. Everything is going according to plan until she finds herself careening out of control down a mountainside and being rescued by a guy who looks like Superman's hotter Italian cousin. HRH Prince Nico is intrigued by the woman he saved on the slopes and her refusal to date him. He offers Kat a deal - let him show her his country and he'll pay her to write articles that will help Monterra's tourism industry.

FBI Agent Atlee Pine's life was never the same after her twin sister Mercy was kidnapped - and likely killed - 30 years ago. After a lifetime of torturous uncertainty, Atlee's unresolved anger finally gets the better of her on the job, and she finds she has to deal with the demons of her past if she wants to remain with the FBI. Atlee and her assistant head back to Atlee's rural hometown to see what they can uncover about the traumatic night Mercy was taken and Pine was almost killed. But soon after Atlee begins her investigation, a local woman is found ritualistically murdered.

Big Burr, Kansas is the kind of place where everyone seems to know everyone - or so they think. But when a national nonprofit labels Big Burr “the most homophobic town in the US” and sends in a queer task force to live and work there for two years, no one is prepared for what will ensue.

Whether it’s meditation or a walk in nature, reading a sacred text or saying a prayer, there are many ways to tap into a heightened awareness of the world around you and your place in it. In The Awakened Brain, psychologist Dr. Lisa Miller shows you how. Weaving her own deeply personal journey of awakening with her groundbreaking research, Dr. Miller’s book reveals that humans are universally equipped with a capacity for spirituality, and that our brains become more resilient and robust as a result of it.

Emily Porter, a recently divorced conservator at the Art Institute of Chicago, is charged with the restoration of a statue of a medieval English knight. Breaking curses was not part of the job description. And yet, here he is, the man of her dreams come to life, resplendent in shining armor as he joyously barrels into priceless antiquities...and goes on to dismantle her defenses, wreak havoc on her senses, and tempt her to believe once more in happy-ever-afters.

Clara Lawson is torn from her life in an instant. Without warning, her home is invaded by armed men, and she finds herself separated from her beloved husband and daughters. The last thing her husband yells to her is to say nothing. In chapters that alternate between past and present, the novel slowly unpeels the layers of Clara's fractured life. We see her growing up, raised with her sisters by the stern Mama and Papa G, becoming a poised and educated young woman, falling desperately in love with the forbidden son of her adoptive parents.

The 1950s are on the horizon, and Archer is in dire need of a fresh start after a nearly fatal detour in Poca City. So Archer hops on a bus and begins the long journey out west to California, where rumor has it there is money to be made if you’re hard-working, lucky, criminal - or all three. Along the way, Archer stops in Reno, where a stroke of fortune delivers him a wad of cash and an eye-popping blood-red 1939 Delahaye convertible - plus a companion for the final leg of the journey, an aspiring actress named Liberty Callahan who is planning to try her luck in Hollywood.

Everyone is talking about Jennie Sue Baker and the mess she made of her life in New York. The former high school queen bee - and wealthy darling of Bloom, Texas - has returned home after all these years, riding on a common bus and bearing two bounced alimony checks. In a town that thrives on gossip, Jennie’s fall from grace has shamed her mother, set the town buzzing, and caused old, jealous enemies to whisper in delight. They say she’s taken a job as a housekeeper, gotten a garage apartment, and might be crushing on Rick Lawson, a simple farmer with modest dreams.

In need of an escape from her ex-fiance's betrayal, and the lucky recipient of a surprise inheritance, Sonya MacTavish leaves behind her life in the city and moves to a Victorian mansion on the coast of Maine. The house is beautiful but comes with surprises - footsteps in the night, doors slamming, music playing - and in her dreams Sonya sees glimpses of the past and the brides who once lived there. As the house reveals more of its history and the sad stories of the brides murdered there, Sonya discovers an antique mirror. She finds herself drawn to the mirror, sensing it holds dark secrets.

Your body contains a symphony of tiny timepieces, synchronized to the sun and subtle signals in your environment and behavior. But modern insults like artificial light, contrived time zones, and late-night meals can wreak havoc on your internal clocks. Armed with advances in biology and technology, a circadian renaissance is reclaiming those lost rhythms. The Inner Clock explores the emerging science and its transformative applications: How could taking a walk in the morning and going to bed at the same time each night keep your body in sync?

Tessa Wilson's life is all over the map. She may be clumsy, but this time she's stumbled into a pickle by choice, not by accident. She's agreed to take a month-long trip around Texas jammed into a '59 Cadillac with a drama-loving teenager, two elderly spitfires, and—oh, yes—her biological mama who gave her away at birth. And the ride gets even crazier when hot-as-sin cowboy Branch Thomas crosses into her lane. They don't call him the sexiest man in the Lone Star State for nothin'.

Liberty Jones dreams of the wider world beyond Welcome, Texas, and has the determination to find it. She also has an untamed heart that leads her into trouble . . . and into the arms of Hardy Cates. Liberty is forbidden fruit Hardy knows he shouldn’t taste. He’s got ambitions and Liberty is a complication he doesn’t want. But neither can deny the attraction between them, a fire that’s both magical and dangerous. Then Hardy is gone. Raising the young sister who needs her and tending her bruised heart, Liberty is vulnerable to the charms of a billionaire tycoon.

In 1977, Claire Lake, Oregon, was shaken by the Lady Killer Murders: Two men, seemingly randomly, were murdered with the same gun, with strange notes left behind. Beth Greer was the perfect suspect - a rich, eccentric 23-year-old woman, seen fleeing one of the crimes. But she was acquitted, and she retreated to the isolation of her mansion.

Will Darcy is everything Lizzy Bennet is not. Aloof, arrogant…and rich. Of course, he’s never cared about money. In fact, it’s number one on his long list of things that irk him. Number two? His friend Charlie’s insistence on setting him up with his new girlfriend’s sharp-tongued sister. Lizzy Bennet is all wrong for him, from her money-hungry family to her uncanny ability to speak to him as bluntly as he does everyone else. But then maybe that’s why he can’t stop thinking about her.

Hannah Cooper's daughter is leaving for college soon. The change is bittersweet. A single mother since the age of eighteen, Hannah isn't eager to confront the pain of being alone, but she's determined not to let her own hang-ups keep Ellen from the future she deserves. As Ellen's high school graduation approaches, Hannah decides it's time to return to her roots in Cooper's Hollow along Virginia's beautiful and rustic Cub Creek.

In Bonnet, Texas, Liddy Latham, the queen of funeral dinners, keeps a Southern comfort-food tradition alive - until fancy-schmancy Matilda Monroe moves back to town. She wants room at the table for her own style of consolation and closure: healthy, modern, and vegan. But this is about more than fried chicken versus tofu turkey. Matilda’s return is also stirring up their volatile, unresolved history. And just when they thought it couldn’t get more personal.

The Cahills of San Francisco are famous for two things: their vast wealth, and the scandals that surround them. Murder, greed, deadly ambition...some people will do anything to get, and keep, the Cahills' kind of money. Not that James Cahill wants any of it. He's tried to make his own way, less interested in a future inheritance than in his construction company - and in enjoying the many women taken in by the easy charms of a handsome, soon-to-be-rich bad boy.

It's 1924 in Branchville, South Carolina, and three women have come to a crossroads. Gertrude, a mother of four, must make an unconscionable decision to save her daughters. Retta, a first-generation freed slave, comes to Gertrude's aid by watching her children, despite the gossip it causes in her community. Annie, the matriarch of the influential Coles family, offers Gertrude employment at her sewing circle, while facing problems of her own at home.