Bruce and Karen Gowen are facing a retirement that neither one wants. Bruce can't imagine life without employment. Karen wants change, adventure, a chance to spread her wings and fly away after thirty years of raising their large family.Their opportunity comes in a way they can both support: helping their daughter and son-in-law with a hotel project in Panajachel, Guatemala.Never ones to do anything half way, the Gowens sell everything, including one of their businesses. What they can't sell, they give away. With their worldly possessions down to two checked bags and two carry-ons each, they fly one way to Guatemala City. Then on to Panajachel, a tourist town on scenic Lake Atitlan, in the southern highlands of Guatemala.Here they begin their new life, a time filled with incredible experiences, tough challenges, and unexpected adventure in one of the most beautiful settings on earth. A place where the Maya culture permeates the land. A land and people that will transform anyone fortunate enough to encounter the magic of these hills in Guatemala.
Now that Elinor and Marianne are married, sixteen-year-old Margaret Dashwood is next, according to the teasing Sir John Middleton and his mother-in-law Mrs. Jennings. A young woman of no fortune and little to recommend her, however, Margaret's romantic notions are limited.On holiday to Bath with her mother, Margaret befriends Miss Barbara Spooner, the future wife of the eminent Member of Parliament, William Wilberforce. Unlike Margaret's silly friends the Carey sisters, Barbara cares about things of substance, such as religion, the education of the poor, and the abolition of slavery.On the way home, Margaret and her family visit Whitwell, the beautiful estate of Colonel Brandon's relations, the Talleyrands. They are a most agreeable family, except for the bothersome son, Benjamin, who teases her mercilessly.Unexpected events take Margaret away from Devonshire, leading her into the center of fashionable London society, to her childhood home of Norland Park and to the seaside town of Brighton. Finally, into the wild beauty and terrible poverty of Cheddar Gorge, where Margaret gains a wider view of the world.Based on Sense and Sensibility, this historical fiction by award-winning author Carol Pratt Bradley, is written in Austen's style with wit and humor, exploring the question: Whatever became of the little sister, Margaret Dashwood?
All relationships require skill in the management of the differences couples inevitably experience, even in the best of times.The Bloom's latest book provides practical steps, compelling examples and real stories about repairing relationships. Damaged partnerships can recover their former level of mutual satisfaction and become more loving and stronger at the broken places.Every crisis provides an opportunity to break through limiting beliefs into new possibilities. Such transformation is not only possible in times of upheaval, but is more likely to occur during difficulties than in times of normalcy.
It's 1968 and Cathryn Vogeley is eighteen, unmarried and pregnant. With a wedding no longer an option, she decides to put her baby girl up for adoption and never think about it again. Her decision shapes the rest of her life.For decades Cathryn allows this choice to define her value as a woman, a wife, and a mother. In every relationship, in every hobby, she searches for something or someone to soothe the constant ache in her chest created by the loss of her infant daughter. Cathryn's search for healing reveals that her grief is not only for the child she gave up, but the childhood she lost.This beautifully-written memoir tells the haunting story of a woman who spends almost fifty years overcoming the consequences of one decision in order to find forgiveness, understanding, and peace.
Larry Franklin believes he should have known on that summer day in 1950 that this was not normal. But he was the youngest and smallest of the four boys in a place where the unspeakable was normal.In 1992, when Franklin turned fifty, a chance conversation with his mother opened the door to repressed memories of physical and sexual abuse. The worst left him hugging the bathroom stool throughout the night. As his mind began to crumble, a piece here, a piece there, he learned that the trips to the barn were far from normal. Separating fact from fiction was like finding a gnat in the forest.The 90s were damning times for the believers of repressed memories. Non-believers shunned those who claimed to be victims of childhood sexual abuse. These doubts and Franklin's reluctance to believe the unbelievable, increased his anxieties and likely added years to his struggle.With the guidance of his therapist, Franklin began his twenty-year journey from sexual abuse to a better life. He went from short-term to long-term therapy with a psychologist and a few individuals who became Franklin's support group. Together they served as a non-judgmental team that helped him through the most challenging time of his life.His memoir is a blueprint for moving from victim to a survivor; a place where injured souls can flourish when light is allowed to shine. The story is an emotion-packed story designed to allow the curious reader to visit a different world.
Non-fiction Finalist, Chanticleer International Book AwardsFourteen-year-old Rachel guards a collection of secrets for ten years, journaling to vent her terror and loneliness.Following Rachel's fatal overdose years later, her mother, Carolyn DiPasquale, stumbles upon her daughter's diaries. Shattered, she searches for answers, retracing her steps to figure out how parents and doctors missed three major mental illnesses.What the single, working mother recalls is a far cry from what happens, as dramatically revealed in tandem chapters gleaned from Rachel's journals.While the mother sprints from task to task, the daughter details the baffling emergence and frightening progression of bulimia, diabulimia, and borderline personality disorder; her eventual substance abuse; and heart-wrenching reasons for not seeking help.Despite her loss, DiPasquale hopes her story lights a path for victims of mental illness while awakening all readers."Reckless Grace tells the story of a common struggle-one of a family navigating a loved one's mental illness-through a powerful, unique lens. Carolyn DiPasquale's firsthand narrative, punctuated by actual passages from her daughter's journals, offers an intimate perspective on self-medication through substance use. It's exactly what we need to help normalize a much-needed national conversation on mental health and addiction."- Former U.S. Congressman Patrick J. Kennedy
The world of Gritt is dead-its inhabitants just haven''t caught up yet.For years, Ryan has saved money to leave. Sand sailors willing to cross the desert are expensive. A month more of work and she and her younger sister will kiss Gritt goodbye.But their time is cut short. Ryan is an Imperial, and The Seeker has orders to stop her from leaving-and breathing.If there''s one thing the people of Gritt are known for, it''s their ability to survive. Now Ryan needs this skill more than ever before. She must rely on her wits, tenacity, and a bit of luck to carry out the plan.There''s no more time to wait. Ryan must get herself and those she cares about safely away from this hellish landscape.
Gold Medal Winner in Non-fiction Cultural, Readers Favorite, 2021One hot June afternoon in Durban, South Africa, a child is born. Doctors and nurses marvel because the birth is one of the rarest in the world. The child, Gillian August, is born still shrouded in her amniotic sac. She is a caul baby, and in 1970s South Africa, this heralds greatness.Or it might have, had August''s caul not been stolen within hours of her birth.A belief in predetermined outcomes looms large in Thorp''s family, culture, and her perception of the world. After all, a lifetime of loss seems to confirm the misery promised by the theft of her caul.Gillian is a Coloured girl born under Apartheid who overcomes unimaginable tragedy, loss, and abuse to find her voice and to help others find theirs.This is her story, one where thieves give more than they take, and where something great comes from places where nothing at all is expected.
Nine-year-old Susanna Hutchison witnessed the massacre of her mother and seven siblings before being taken captive by the tribe who slaughtered her family and burned their home to the ground. Eventually, she found a place and a family in the Indian village.When a group of Dutch discovered her years later, she begged to stay with the Indians. But they and the Dutch traded goods for the white girl, and Susanna was forced to leave the village.Returned to Boston and to her brother, Susanna finds everything strange. Now fifteen, she is an outsider among her own people. John Winthrop and the other local authorities are watching her and her brother closely. They have determined that Susanna will conform to the strict society and not become like her outspoken, renegade mother Anne Hutchison.Susanna is not even sure she wants acceptance back into Puritan society, where she feels like an object of pity and scorn. And she certainly does not welcome the attentions of their tall young neighbor, John Cole.Caught between two worlds and belonging to neither, Susanna wonders how she can possibly build a new life out of the ashes of what went before.
Wisconsin family physician, Dr. James Damos, knows firsthand what rural practice can contribute to the body of medicine and to the communities they serve.While most of today's medical students will choose specialized fields of care in a city environment, James Damos bucked the trend. For the past few decades, medical schools have steered their students toward specialization and away from the option of serving as a doctor in a small community. Damos would like to see this changed.Using real-life examples and illustrations from his own experience practicing in a small town, Dr. Damos provides a glimpse into the exciting challenges these doctors face day to day.Damos also describes the health challenges his own family has endured, detailing their struggles with childhood cancer and Alzheimer's Disease. These traumatic events and others described in this heartfelt memoir drive home the benefits of a close-knit community.From the viewpoint of a doctor, a husband and a father, Jim Damos illustrates how genuine personal relationships and a connection with others is sometimes the best medicine.
In 1960, the Badre family emigrates from Beirut, Lebanon to the United States, a dream come true for fourteen-year-old Nasib.Nasib struggles to assimilate as a teen in Albany, New York. With limited English skills, he attempts to learn new customs, make friends, and adapt to a different culture. In Beirut, the Badre family was well-known and socially privileged. In America, they are unknown nobodies. Nasib adopts his father's name "Albert," and to further Americanize his name, young Albert becomes "Al."Despite the many frustrations and difficulties, Al's ultimate goal is to become a successful American. The new anonymity actually inspires the young man. Excited by the opportunities available to him in his new country, he determines to make a potent contribution to society.As he strives to adapt, Al reads voraciously, becoming increasingly interested in religion and philosophy. Books become his "American friends," and reading soon prompts him to ask deep theological questions about his family's Lebanese Protestant roots, his mother's conversion to Catholicism, and the contrast between the Protestant and Catholic faiths. This ultimately leads to his Catholic conversion.Al's search for meaning in life leads him to social activism among New York City's poorest. And, in time, to graduate studies, where his desire is to improve the human condition through information technology.Al Badre- like many other American immigrants-works his way through hardship to achieve a meaningful place in his adopted nation.
Wild with guilt and anger over her failing marriage, Maggie Ryder escapes to the safety of an Illinois farmhouse during a full-blown blizzard. Maggie has been hired by the owners to do some stencil painting in the dining room. But why aren't Louise and Sid Shaw not home to welcome her?Maggie risked her life driving through the harrowing storm and doesn't mind being alone in the warmth and safety of the house. Not at first.But then a stranger walks down the stairs and into the kitchen. He says he's Ian Shaw, Louise and Sidney's son, and that his parents headed upstate ahead of the storm to visit their daughter.Snowbound with him for six days and nights, isolated by ground blizzards and impassable country roads, Maggie forms a headstrong attachment to the talented and amusing young man.When they leave the house together, Maggie is caught up in mysteries of theft and unexplained deaths. She questions Ian's identity, what crimes he might have committed, and how much her impulsive loyalty to him will cost her in the end.
The Junior class of the Prairie Winds School of Flight has flown over two hundred miles to compete in the annual South Dakota competition for red-tailed hawks.Two days later with the competition completed, they depart for home despite threatening weather. The happy young flyers eagerly take to the air, their youthful hearts beating as one. But eight hours into their twelve-hour flight, they disappear without a trace.When Kate Flannery, a friend of the hawks since the age of twelve, learns the class has gone missing, she launches a rescue mission. Heading off into the teeth of the South Dakota storm, Kate is determined to find the missing young red-tailed hawks.However, Kate finds herself facing much worse than the dangers of the blizzard. Once again, hawks and humans must unite to help save those they love.
The lives of one highly educated red-tailed hawk named Orville and Kate, a 12-year-old girl, intersect one day on South Dakota ranchland. Orville has a slight vision problem due to faulty DNA, and Kate needs a friend. When Orville crash lands into the side of the Flannery's home, Kate and her parents rescue him and take him to the local vet for treatment.With Orville's broken leg nearly healed, he and Kate go fishing. Orville flies back, carrying the fishing pole in his talons, as part of his physical therapy, while Kate walks alone across the vast prairie. Only she does not arrive.Her parents gone for the Labor Day Weekend, leaving a slightly addled grandmother at home, now creates a desperate situation for Kate. Orville and his schoolmates, the county sheriff's department, and a police dog named Deputy Grace must combine forces to find Kate before it's too late.
It is 1951. Young Jake Conner gets on a bus to visit his cousins in the Mississippi Delta. But when the body of an unknown man is found in the Mississippi River, Jake's summer vacation gets a little more adventurous as he and his cousins snoop around in a mystery that is better left to the grown-ups. "Jake Conner, protagonist and narrator of this coming of age novel, reminds me of Mattie in True Grit and Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird. Sharp eyes tempered with childhood simplicity." Delta Magazine "First time novelist, Paul H. Yarbrough, masterfully transports readers deep into the world of Mississippi Cotton, where life is not as simple as it seems." Julie Cantrell, editor, Southern Literary Review; author, Into the Free "Paul H. Yarbrough has painted wonderful images with his words. His writing brings back so many memories. Even if you didn't grow up in Mississippi, you will enjoy Mississippi Cotton." Mary Ann Mobley Collins Former Miss America, Miss Mississippi
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