Showing results by narrator "Laura Hicks" in All Categories

One Thousand White Women is the story of May Dodd and a colorful assembly of pioneer women who travel to the Western prairies in 1875 to intermarry among the Cheyenne Indians.

It's Sharon McCone's first case as staff investigator for All Souls Legal Cooperative. She knows nothing about antiques, yet she has an affection for Salem Street with its charming mix of antique and curio shops. Now elderly dealer Joan Albritton has been found dead, stabbed with an antique dagger. Her neighbors are shocked. Recurring vandalism has them frightened. Ferreting out the facts will take Sharon from the chaotic jumble of the junk dealer's establishment to a museum where San Francisco's most elegant socialites gather.

What would make the perfect man? That's the deliciously racy topic that Jaine Bright and her three girlfriends are pondering one night at their favorite after-hours hot spot: Mr. Perfect. Would he be tall, dark, and handsome? Caring and warmhearted - or will just muscular do? As their conversation heats up, they concoct a tongue-in-cheek checklist that becomes an overnight sensation, spreading like wildfire at work and sizzling along email lines. But what began as a joke among friends turns deadly serious when one of the four women is murdered....

Cannie Shapiro never wanted to be famous. The smart, sharp, plus-sized pop culture reporter was perfectly content writitng about other people's lives in the pages of the Philadlphia Examiner. But the day she opened up a national women's magazine to find out that her ex-boyfriend has been chronicling their ex-sex life is the day her life changes forever.

Monk's house is being fumigated, and he has nowhere to go. Fortunately, his assistant Natalie and her daughter are kind enough to welcome him into their home. Unfortunately, their home is not quite up to Monk's standards of cleanliness and order. But while Monk attempts to arrange his surroundings just so, something else needs to be put straight. The death of a dog at the local firehouse - on the same night as a fatal house fire - has led Monk into a puzzling mystery.

Sile is a stylish citizen of the new Dublin, a veteran flight attendant who's traveled the world. Jude is a 25-year-old archivist, stubbornly attached to the tiny town of Ireland, Ontario, in which she was born and raised. On her first plane trip, Jude's and Sile's worlds touch and snag at Heathrow Airport. In the course of the next year, their lives, and those of their friends and families, will be drawn into a new, shaky orbit.

The Vengeance of Mothers is an audiobook that explores what happens to the bonds between wives and husbands, children and mothers, when society sees them as "unspeakable." What does it mean to be white, to be Cheyenne, and how far will these women go to avenge the ones they love? As he did in One Thousand White Women, Jim Fergus brings to light a time and place in American history, and fills it with unforgettable characters who live and breathe with a passion we can relate to even today.

Some people think Hawaii is paradise, but Monk knows that danger, like dirt, lurks everywhere. Look at Helen Gruber, the rich tourist who took a fatal blow from a coconut. The police say it fell from a tree, but Monk suspects otherwise. His assistant Natalie isn't exactly thrilled about Monk's latest investigation. It was bad enough Monk followed her on vacation, and now it looks like the vacation is over.

Susanna desperately wants to join the circle of girls who meet every week at the parsonage. What she doesn’t realize is that the leader of the group, the malicious Ann Putnam, is about to set off a torrent of false accusations leading to the imprisonment and execution of countless innocent people. When Susanna puts the pieces together, she faces a painful choice.

On a return trip from Germany, Monk and Natalie stop over in Paris. They visit the catacombs - a vast, underground cavern in the center of the city, lined with millions of ancient human bones. Monk picks up a skull and announces that this person was murdered - by a modern weapon made in the last few years. He thinks someone hid a recent murder victim among the old bones.

Rachel Keats and Jack McGill were artists, deeply in love when they married, until the rush of life took its toll and they divorced. Six years later, Jack puts aside his career as a leading architect to hold a bedside vigil at his ex-wife's hospital bed. Jack begins to see Rachel, his daughters, and the story of his marriage with new eyes. Coast Road celebrates those things in life that matter most - the companionship of friends and the irreplaceable time spent with children and family.

In 1873, a Cheyenne chief offers President Grant the opportunity to exchange one thousand horses for one thousand White women, in order to marry them with his warriors and create a lasting peace. These women, "recruited" by force in the penitentiaries and asylums of the country, gradually integrate the way of life of the Cheyenne, at the time when the great massacres of the tribes begin.

Mac McQuarry knew better than to mix women and work. And he had enough trouble of his own: The disgraced former cop had been demoted after an explosive shakedown of the Charleston police department. But when Julie Carlson hires him to spy on her cheating husband, Mac can't resist. Not only is she drop-dead gorgeous, but her husband was a player in Mac's inglorious downfall. But what begins as a run-of-the-mill assignment spiced by a fiery flirtation suddenly spirals into a harrowing race for survival.

Winter 1906. Nearing bankruptcy after surviving drought, storms, and the rustling of her cattle, Sarah remains a stalwart pillar to her extended family. Then a stagecoach accident puts in her path three strangers who will change her life. In sickness and in health, neighbor Udell Hanna remains a trusted friend, pressing for Sarah to marry. When he reveals a plan to grant Sarah her dearest wish, she is overwhelmed with passion and excitement.

A fearless and spirited pilot conquers Hollywood. Now can she survive movie stardom? In 1945 Velva Jean Hart is a bona fide war heroine. After a newsreel film of her triumphant return to America, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer promises to make her a star. They give her a new life story and a brand-new name. As "Kit Rogers", she navigates the movie sets, recording sessions, parties, staged romances, and occasional backstabbing that accompany her newfound fame.

Regan Reilly is in New York to attend a crime conference organized by her celebrity-author mother. A friend, Thomas Pilsner - the frenetic president of the Settlers' Club on Gramercy Park - calls Regan, desperately pleading for help. Thomas is distraught over the sudden suspicious deaths of two members of the Settler's Club. The men had promised to donate a cache of valuable diamonds to save the club. But now the diamonds are gone, the men are dead, and Thomas is a mess.

Along with their husbands, Amanda, Karen, and Georgia are a close-knit circle of friends enjoying seemingly ideal lives in an upscale neighborhood. But when they learn that their lovely younger neighbor, widowed for a year and presumably still unattached, is pregnant, the strains and imperfections of their lives come into full focus. As they ponder who the father might be, each of the women harbors suspicions about her own husband - and each is forced to a crisis point that will strengthen or shatter her marriage.

Settled in to their new home after they lost their house in a fire, and fully established in their new shared offices, private investigator Sharon McCone and her business partner husband, Hy, are finally starting to feel comfortable. That calm is shattered when Hy's former colleague, Gage Renshaw - a shady troublemaker whom they presumed dead - reappears, and it's unclear what he wants from his prosperous former associate.

Between 1854 and 1930, more than 200,000 orphaned or abandoned children were sent west on orphan trains to find new homes. Some were adopted by loving families; others were not as fortunate. In recent years, some of the riders have begun to share their stories. Andrea Warren alternates chapters about the history of the orphan trains with the story of Lee Nailling, who in 1926 rode an orphan train to Texas.

To tourists, bay-windowed Victorian mansions are quaint, peaceful symbols of old San Francisco, but on the secluded hill above Steiner Street, the gingerbread has sparked a bitter battle. Ambitious developers are pushing for restoration and residents are fighting for their homes… until a controversial restorationist is found dead on the job, awash in garish housepaint. Private investigator Sharon McCone is called in only to discover a second bitter feud, this time between the developers and members of the city's powerful architectural community.