After high school most students grow up and put the experience behind them. This is a story of a couple of individuals that did not.A class reunion is a meeting of former classmates, typically organized at or near their former school by one of the class on or around an anniversary of their graduation. Former teachers may be invited as well. They reminisce about their school days and bring each other up to date on what has happened to each of them since they went their separate ways.In film and literature, especially comedy, crime novels, thrillers and psychological suspense novels, class reunions have been a frequent device used to show the eruption of emotions such as shame, hatred or guilt within individual characters who, suddenly faced again with their own youth, become aware of the fact that they have been unable to cope with their past. In many cases, those who used to be bullied, humiliated or in any other way mistreated by their teachers and/or classmates believe that now their chance has come to take revenge on their former torturers. Often in fiction, participants nostalgically reminisce about their old school days, fondly remember their school pranks. Alumni are quite often concerned about how their lives have turned out when compared with the lives of their former classmates, and will sometimes feel pressured enough to go to great lengths to concoct stories about their fruitful careers, personal accomplishments and relationships with others.Another staple of this kind of fiction is former classmates taking up with their old flame again, either because they have changed to their advantage and developed into an admirable adult or precisely for the opposite reason—because they have not changed at all in a fleeting world.

The beginning to the end. The last three hundred years has not been kind to the Mages of the Empire Seas region and in a world where having magic or magical items could get you executed on the spot, one group of individuals have set out to find and protect seven magical Stones that, in the hands of the enemy, could destroy everything.The Quest for the Stones of Magic will take one young boy and will either turn him into the man he was meant to be or destroy him completely. The loss of everything that he has, everything that he has ever known, has forced Mach Derune into making a decision that he would never have dreamed he would need to make. Does he search for the last member of his family in the hopes that she is still alive? Or, does he follow a group that may lead him to the one responsible for the destruction of his home? Either choice he makes will take him down the road of revenge, but the path he takes will show him far more about himself than he ever thought possible. The strength and courage of his newly found friends gives Mach an insight to himself that was never there before. Their willingness to allow him to forge his own path leads him down a road of discovery that will show him just how strong he is and how true the lessons of his late father were. The Stones of Magic have resurfaced after three hundred years and two forces will collide in order to obtain them. The Power they wield was enough that the Great Mages of Old refused to use them in order to prevent the genocide of their own race. Will Mach find himself a pawn of the Power of the Stones, or will he and the others find a way to control it.

Lucas Thissel has something he fears: an alien species of palm-sized glass fairies called Lucent Sylphs. They came through a portal from a parallel, metaphysical dimension, and they indenture themselves as slaves to human beings. Too much neglect or unkindness, and they will cloud over and disintegrate. Too much love and their hearts are overcome and burst. And one has attached herself to him.Lucas Thissel has something he fears: an alien species of palm-sized glass fairies. They are Lucent Sylphs. They started arriving recently, in the middle of the United Statues, from a parallel, metaphysical dimension, and they indenture themselves, as slaves to human beings, in exchange for gold.A Lucent Sylph does not eat or sleep, but is fueled on human emotion. Her insides are made up of a single giant heart that captures and feeds off of the strong feelings around her. Too much neglect or unkindness, and a Lucent Sylph will cloud over and disintegrate. Too much love and attachment, and the heart will be overcome and burst.The first one Lucas saw in person was owned by his friend. She had a name.Nissa.His friend, who owned her, had no self-control. She would die.

Linda's new boyfriend Pete enjoyed looking at stately homes. She was horrified, when they went to The Old Grange, where a big reenactment weekend was taking place, to find he was planning to steal some of the antiques and expected her to help him. Furiously angry, she found help from a knight in armour, and together they determined to foil the crooks.Previously Her Stolen Heart by Bridget Thorn.Linda's new boyfriend Pete enjoyed looking at stately homes. She was horrified, when they went to The Old Grange, where a big re-enactment weekend was taking place, to find he was planning to steal some of the antiques and expected her to help him.Furiously angry, she found help from a knight in armour, and together they determined to foil the crooks.Previously published as "Her Stolen Heart" under the pseudonym Bridget Thorn.

The Little Dionysus Playhouse, like all community theaters, is a different place every day, as different people with different goals come in and out doing their thing. The ten stories in this collection explore both the drama and the comedy that happen in a community playhouse, both on and off the stage.Experience the love, fear, frustration, silliness and insanity of a typical community theater in these ten short stories. Meet the directors, actors, board members, technicians, audience members and visitors whose perceptions and adventures make the Little Dionysus Playhouse a different place every day.

Jerry Price has just killed his own mother. He had no choice. After ingesting a street narcotic called Vision, she changed into a cannibalistic creature, and he was next on the menu. Struggling with guilt he sets out with his pet ferret Whisper and his own malevolent shadow to discover the secrets of vision and himself.Jerry Price has just killed his own mother. He had no choice. After ingesting a street narcotic called Vision, she changed into a cannibalistic creature, and he was next on the menu.Institutionalized in an asylum, Jerry is left to struggle with the guilt over his mother's death, until he is broken out by the unlikely duo of a talking ferret named Whisper and Jerry's own shadow. Together the three set out to learn the secrets of Vision which are literally out of this world.

Fearless Crisis Manager Laurel Quinn returns as a mysterious and dangerous force known as ‘TSK511’ has risen, wreaking havoc on unsuspecting celebs and murdering anyone who gets in their way. This book contains 8 brand new short stories filled with scandals ripped from the tabloids and page turning cliffhangers; all leading up to an ending that will change Laurel’s life tragically forever!This is the second volume in the 'Publicity!' series which follows ruthless, quick witted and independent Crisis Manager Laurel Quinn. The book is filled with eight short stories.The story begins a week after the first volume where Laurel's assistant Tony Vincetti discovered that her father is New York City's deadliest Kingpin Vincent Capella. Tony feels betrayed that she never told him this truth as he was always honest with her and his lecture is cut short when an actor enters showing Laurel a letter he received from someone named 'TSK511' and they're blackmailing him threatening to reveal a secret he thought he hid away. After Laurel is told about the actor's "scary" secret she didn't believe this mysterious person was capable of inflicting any real damage-that is until Darlene Hart-from the first volume- is brutally murdered by someone who leaves a note simply saying 'One Life Holds Bloody Hands When Death Becomes Her. TSK511'.Throughout the book Laurel is fixing scandals that seem to be lead back to this mysterious person and every time she gets closer another person is killed and if things couldn't get any more worst; a ghost from Laurel's past resurfaces threatening her freedom. This book contains seven short stories with scandals ripped straight from the tabloids, absurd characters, the return of old faces, shocking twists and turns, page turning cliffhangers and an ending so surprising that readers will probably hate me for it. [Trigger Warnings: There are four murders (stabbing & shooting) in the story and scenes of two men in love, kissing and cuddling. If you are against Homosexuality or any one who identifies as LGBTQIA then I advise you not to read this book as I am a Gay Man myself and you'll be insulted with every word you read. Thankies! :) ]

Twenty Four WeeksEpisode 19- "Thirty"Wade gives Judd a sizeable bonus… Grant’s life is laid bare at his funeral… Quinn makes a confession…“I’m a selfish person,” she says, putting down her book.“No. You’re not.”“I am.”“Why do you say that?” I ask her.“What I did to you - that was immensely selfish. I was thinking about myself, what I needed, what I wanted. I wasn’t thinking of you at all."Twenty Four WeeksEpisode 19- "Thirty"Wade gives Judd a sizeable bonus… Grant’s life is laid bare at his funeral… Quinn makes a confession…“I’m a selfish person,” she says, putting down her book.“No. You’re not.”“I am.”“Why do you say that?” I ask her.“What I did to you - that was immensely selfish. I was thinking about myself, what I needed, what I wanted. I wasn’t thinking of you at all. And I should have...Still reeling from the shock of discovering his wife's infidelity, Judd Altman learns that he has lost his father and will be one himself. His soon to be ex-wife, Quinn, is pregnant with his child.After almost losing the baby, Wade (Judd's old boss and Quinn's lover) realizes the truth about himself and his relationship with Quinn and leaves her. Judd, in the face of Quinn's situation, forgives her, but cannot reconcile their marriage.With nothing but a stolen Porsche, Judd drives to Maine with limitless possibilities. A man with nothing has nothing to lose, and a man with nothing to lose can do anything.Twenty Four Weeks begins with Judd's time of reflection in Maine and his eventual decision to return to New York City, to take back the life that has been so cruelly taken from him. Sometimes humorous, this bitter-sweet tale is full of hope, love and forgiveness.With characters and back story based on the novel "This is Where I Leave You" by Jonathan Tropper, Twenty Four Weeks is set after the events of the movie of the same name.

Volumes 1-3 in the Bad Boy Rebels Series My name is Zhara and my life is complicated. I’ve spent the last couple of years pretending to be a good girl. But that changed the day the Bad Boy Rebels asked me to join a secret detective program and work undercover, pretending to date all of them. All the guys are sexy and love to get into trouble.  And the number one rule to my assignment of dating them: I can no longer act like a good girl… I think I’m in way over my head… This is a reverse harem series. The Bad Boy Rebels series that follows Zhara and six guys who are part of a secret detective program. It contains a lot of kissing, steamy scenes, with a bit of suspense, and mystery.

Set in Bombay in the mid-1990s, Family Matters tells a story of familial love and obligation, of personal and political corruption, of the demands of tradition and the possibilities for compassion. Nariman Vakeel, the patriarch of a small discordant family, is beset by Parkinson’s and haunted by memories of his past. He lives with his two middle-aged stepchildren, Coomy, bitter and domineering, and her brother, Jal, mild-mannered and acquiescent. But the burden of the illness worsens the already strained family relationships. Soon, their sweet-tempered half-sister, Roxana, is forced to assume sole responsibility for her bedridden father. And Roxana’s husband, besieged by financial worries, devises a scheme of deception involving his eccentric employer at a sporting goods store, setting in motion a series of events that leads to the narrative’s moving outcome. Family Matters has all the richness, the gentle humour, and the narrative sweep that have earned Mistry the highest of accolades around the world.

Natalie Black, the U.S. ambassador to the Court of St. James, has returned to Washington, her job in jeopardy. Her fiancé, George McCallum, Viscount Lockenby, has died in a car accident, and mysterious rumors begin that she’s responsible begin to surface: she broke off the engagement and, heartbroken, he killed himself. Then someone tries to force her off the M-2 outside London. Again, rumors claim it was a sympathy ploy. When she returns to the United States, she’s nearly killed when a car tries to mow her down while she’s out for a run. No one believes her except FBI Special Agent Davis Sullivan. Meanwhile someone is following Sherlock. A stalker? Then someone tries to shoot her from the back of a motorcycle, but the assailant gets away. Sherlock next gets a call from an Atlanta mental hospital warning her that Blessed Backman has escaped. This is not good news. Blessed is a talented psychopath out for revenge against the agents, primarily Sherlock, whom his dying mother begged him to kill since she and Savich brought down her cult. How to find out who’s trying to kill the ambassador to the U.K.? How can they get their hands on Blessed Backman before he succeeds and kills Sherlock? The clock is ticking and the danger intensifies . . .

Colin McElreath, Viscount Grantham, has sold his soul to the devil—a devil of an irate English father. For cash. Colin is about to become a very wealthy man—a very wealthy married man. The powerful Baron Davies urgently requires a respectable husband for Gillian, his disgraced daughter, and he sees Colin as the perfect candidate. When Colin balks, Davies isn't above using his daughter's large dowry as an incentive—or applying a bit of blackmail. He threatens to expose the undercover work the Free Fellows do for the government, and as a charter member of the Free Fellow League, Colin has sworn to protect the League at all cost. Also someone has been masquerading as Colin, which indirectly landed Gillian in her predicament, so Colin is faced with no choice. He doesn't know whether to laugh or to cry at the irony. After a lifetime of avoiding society misses, he is about to marry one. Miss Gillian Davies is about to become a blushing bride. And Colin McElreath is merely the groom ...

“The name is Jones. Indiana Jones.” He’s back. Everyone’s favorite globe-trotting, tomb-raiding, wisecracking archaeologist is finally at it again–hurtling headfirst into high adventure and relying on his wits, his fists, and his trusty bullwhip to get him out of deep trouble. But the man in the jaunty brown fedora and battered leather jacket is no ordinary digger in the dirt. From the fabled lost Ark of the Covenant to the legendary Holy Grail, he’s salvaged the world’s most amazing artifacts, while beating the baddest villains and defying the most breathtaking odds. Now it’s 1957, the atomic age is in full swing, and McCarthy-era paranoia has the nation on edge. But for Indiana Jones, the Cold War really heats up when his latest expedition is crashed by a ruthless squad of Russian soldiers. Commanded by a sword-wielding colonel who’s as sinister as she is stunning, the menacing Reds drag an unwilling Indy along as they brazenly invade American soil, massacre U.S. soldiers, and plunder a top-secret government warehouse. Their objective: a relic even more precious–and powerful–than the mythic Ark, capable of unlocking secrets beyond human comprehension. Fast thinking and some high-speed maneuvers help Jones turn the tables, and a one-in-a-million escape narrowly saves him from certain death. But when he’s tarred as a suspected spy and fired by his university, Indy thinks it may be time to hang up his hat. Fate, however, has other plans. Suddenly the road to retirement takes a sharp detour when a colleague’s kidnapping leads Jones into the depths of the Amazon jungle on a desperate rescue mission. With a hot-headed teenage biker as his unlikely wing man and his vengeful new Russian nemesis waiting for a rematch, Indy’s back in the game–playing for a prize all the wonders of the world could never rival.

Gunnolf was left for dead when he was young as he went on one of his kin’s raids, but finds his way to the Highlands and a home with the MacNeill Clan. The clan’s seer warns him he must rescue a woman in need, only he rescues the wrong woman. Yet, Brina is in need. Her father, wounded in battle by Gunnolf’s own kind, must oust the tyrant who has taken his place if he is to rule. Yet he needs Gunnolf’s help, but Gunnolf learns Brina’s father had killed Gunnolf’s brother. Brina is torn between hating the Viking who has rescued her, and knowing that his kin had killed her grandfather in an age old tale of fighting between their people, and loving the man who took her under his protection, and the wolf cub she insisted on rescuing. Now, Gunnolf must make a choice: wed the lass as her father has insisted and restore her father’s position as chief of his clan when he’s not sure her father is trustworthy, hoping he can obtain a peace between his people and hers, or leave well enough alone and stay with the MacNeill Clan, his family for the past ten years. The problem is one sweet Highland lass that makes him want a woman—this woman—to warm his bed and have his bairns and to protect and cherish, when having a wife was the furthest notion from his mind…until one prediction changed his whole life.

It’s a conspiracy! Everyone in Corduroy Mansions – that crumbling but beloved mansion block in London’s Pimlico – seems to be struggling with their nearest and dearest. The fine, but crucial line between friendship and romance has become somewhat blurred to fine art graduate Caroline, whilst over at the Ragg Porter Literary Agency business rivalry leads to a an unseemly tussle over the ownership of Autobiography of a Yeti. In the Snark household, psychoanalyst Berthea suffers on two fronts: her brother Terence Moongrove indulges his penchant for fast cars, whilst her son Oedipus Snark M.P., is the unacceptable face of the Liberal Democrats. Even easygoing wine merchant William French finds his loyalties and his troubles increase when his faithful Pimlico terrier, Freddie de la Hay, disappears on a mystery tour around the surrounding countryside. Will he find his way back? Is this the end of Freddie de la Hay? Is this the end of Corduroy Mansions? In the third volume of the lives of the residents of Corduroy mansions, Alexander McCall Smith’s genius for storytelling and eye for the quirky details of modern life conspire to entertaining episodes, and beautifully observed characters. And with friends like these, who needs, well, anything else!

This tender and nostalgic work dates from the same period as Tropic of Cancer (1934). It is a celebration of love, art, and the Bohemian life at a time when the world was simpler and slower, and Miller an obscure, penniless young writer in Paris. Whether discussing the early days of his long friendship with Alfred Perles or his escapades at the Club Melody brothel, in Quiet Days in Clichy Miller describes a period that would shape his entire life and oeuvre.

Dr Temperance Brennan is in unfamiliar territory as she races to learn the truth from the bones - before it's too late. A new, exclusive straight-to-digital short story from Kathy Reichs, world leading forensic anthropologist and No.1 bestselling author of Deja Dead, Bones Are Forever and *Bones of the Lost.*** Dr. Tempe Brennan has seen it all. Human bones. Animal bones. Old bones. Young bones. Male bones. Female bones. What she hasn't seen is all of them mixed together in the same case. Until now. The foothills of North Carolina aren't the only unfamiliar territory Tempe faces as she races to learn the meaning of the Bones in Her Pocket. Multi-million copy, international bestselling thriller writer Kathy Reichs is an expert in forensic science, giving her fiction an authenticity other crime writers would kill for. Bones In Her Pocket also gives readers the first chance to read the opening chapters of Kathy's new thriller, Bones of the Lost, out in August.

"Paula McLain is considered the new star of historical fiction, and for good reason. Fans of The Paris Wife will be captivated by Circling the Sun, which . . . is both beautifully written and utterly engrossing."--Ann Patchett, Country LivingPaula McLain, author of the phenomenal bestseller The Paris Wife, now returns with her keenly anticipated new novel, transporting readers to colonial Kenya in the 1920s. Circling the Sun brings to life a fearless and captivating woman--Beryl Markham, a record-setting aviator caught up in a passionate love triangle with safari hunter Denys Finch Hatton and Karen Blixen, who as Isak Dinesen wrote the classic memoir Out of Africa.Brought to Kenya from England as a child and then abandoned by her mother, Beryl is raised by both her father and the native Kipsigis tribe who share his estate. Her unconventional upbringing transforms Beryl into a bold young woman with a fierce love of...

The Development of an Extraordinary Species We human beings share 98 percent of our genes with chimpanzees. Yet humans are the dominant species on the planet -- having founded civilizations and religions, developed intricate and diverse forms of communication, learned science, built cities, and created breathtaking works of art -- while chimps remain animals concerned primarily with the basic necessities of survival. What is it about that two percent difference in DNA that has created such a divergence between evolutionary cousins? In this fascinating, provocative, passionate, funny, endlessly entertaining work, renowned Pulitzer Prize–winning author and scientist Jared Diamond explores how the extraordinary human animal, in a remarkably short time, developed the capacity to rule the world . . . and the means to irrevocably destroy it.

Fleet officer Heris Serrano came from a family of Fleet officers, so when a lying superior forced her to resign, life lost all meaning. To pay the bills, she became Captain of a rich old lady's interstellar luxury yacht, adding insult to injury. But Cecelia, the rich old lady, had more brains than most admirals Heris had known, and before it was all over, Heris would have a chance to rejoin her beloved space navy -- if she could manage to stop an invading armada.

Esperanza thought she'd always live with her family on their ranch in Mexico — she'd always have fancy dresses, a beautiful home, and servants. But a sudden tragedy forces Esperanza and Mama to flee to California during the Great Depression, and to settle in a camp for Mexican farm workers. Esperanza isn't ready for the hard labor, financial struggles, or lack of acceptance she now faces. When their new life is threatened, Esperanza must find a way to rise above her difficult circumstances — Mama's life, and her own, depend on it. Pam Munoz Ryan eloquently portrays the Mexican workers' plight in this abundant and passionate novel that gives voice to those who have historically been denied one. "When I was a child, I always assumed my grandmother grew up in poverty because the stories she told were primarily about raising her children in farm labor camps in California in the 1930s. It wasn't until I was a young woman that she told me about her childhood in Mexico. I was so moved by her riches-to-rags fairytale that I felt compelled to share her story." — Pam Munoz Ryan.