WANTED: Ladies' maid seeks love with a lord. Is there any way besides subterfuge to gain his notice?Meredith, the heroine of The Countess Takes a Lover, is determined to help her beloved maid Cecile Lambeaux have a fling with the man of her dreams, Sir Nathaniel Covington. Normally reserved Cecile has lost her heart to a man she's watched from a distance. One glimpse of his kindness and his haunted demeanor and she's willing to dare everything for even a brief affair. Meredith makes over Cecile and sets her on a collision course with her social better, not as a ladies' maid but as a lady.Nathaniel attends a house party in order to escape his sadness and meets a woman who touches him deeply. But as Cecile and Nathaniel's connection grows, her deception threatens to destroy it. Will Cecile reveal the truth before Nathaniel finds out in other ways? Meanwhile, the countess and Chris work through their own trust issues and seek a new depth in their relationship.This is a previously...

Amanda McCrina's Traitor is a tightly woven YA thrill ride exploring political conflict, deep-seated prejudice, and the terror of living in a world where deception is a means of survival.Poland, 1944. After the Soviet liberation of Lwów from Germany, the city remains a battleground—its loyalties torn between Poland and Ukraine, its people killed by resistance fighters and insurgent armies. Tolya Korolenko is half-Ukrainian, half-Polish, and joined up with the Soviet Red Army just to keep himself alive and fed. When he not-quite-accidentally shoots his political officer in the street, he's rescued by a squad of insurgent Ukrainians. They might have saved him, but Tolya doesn't trust them. He especially doesn't trust Solovey, the squad's young war-scarred leader. He doesn't know that Solovey failed once before to save his own flesh and blood, and knows the cost of looking out for life over loyalty.Then a betrayal sends them...

A young midwife travels west to the New Mexico Territory to care for women in need and faces dangers more harrowing than the ones she’s fleeing in this epic tale of survival, redemption, and love from Sara Donati, the international bestselling author of the Wilderness series. 1857: In a bid to outrun her past, Carrie Ballentyne accepts a nursing position with a doctor in the New Mexico Territory. She knows the journey from New York to Santa Fe will not be easy, but she relishes the adventure. However, nothing could have prepared her for the wilderness she encounters. Its vastness and power are awe-inspiring, stunning in both beauty and brutality. To endure, she must learn to rely on her fellow travelers—and one enigmatic man in particular. As the small, tight-knit group tackles challenge after challenge, she feels her heart opening to this rugged land—and the people willing to risk so much for one another.   The trip west is...

An accidental dog swap unleashes an unexpected love match in this new romantic comedy from New York Times bestselling author Julia London. Carly Kennedy's life is in a spiral. She is drowning in work, her divorced parents are going through their midlife crises, and somehow Carly's sister convinces her to foster Baxter—a basset hound rescue with a bad case of the blues. When Carly comes home late from work one day to discover that the dog walker has accidentally switched out Baxter for another perkier, friendlier basset hound, she has reached the end of her leash. When Max Sheffington finds a depressed male basset hound in place of his cheerful Hazel, he is bewildered. But when cute, fiery Carly arrives on his doorstep, he is intrigued. He was expecting the dog walker, not a pretty woman with firm ideas about dog discipline. And Carly was not expecting a handsome, bespectacled man to be feeding her dog mac and cheese. Baxter is besotted with Hazel,...

From Publishers WeeklyIt has been nearly 25 years since Bradford made her name with the female rags-to-riches saga A Woman of Substance, the first in a trilogy of novels that concluded with 1988's To Be the Best. Gambling that there is still life to be squeezed out of the story of indomitable super-survivor Emma Harte and her descendants, Bradford returns to the chase with this present-day sequel. The novel opens in 2001 at Pennistone Royal, Emma's magnificent country estate in Yorkshire, now occupied by her granddaughter Paula's family. Paula heads the Knightsbridge store, flagship of the nationwide Harte chain, and her grown daughters, Linnet and Tessa, work there. A young American, Evan Hughes, with an uncanny Harte family resemblance, appears one day seeking a job. She's hired at once, since Linnet needs help with an upcoming fashion spectacular, a retrospective featuring Emma's couture wardrobe. Linnet's cousin Gideon, who works for the Harte newspapers, is smitten with Evan, and soon the mystery of her background is of concern, especially when it's discovered that Evan's grandmother had a close relationship with Emma. The overwhelming amount of descriptive detail clothing, interior decor, food and drink slows down the narrative, but such Victorian props as a decorative locked box, a key taped behind a photograph and long-lost diaries provide mild suspense. The saga was already losing steam with To Be the Best, and this fourth installment is further diluted. Lacking the dynamic impact of the original, it will be best appreciated by those with an irresistible desire to follow the further adventures of the Harte clan.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistEmma Harte, the heroine of Bradford's novel A Woman of Substance (1979), has been dead for more than 30 years when Emma's Secret opens, but her past factors heavily into the events of the novel. At the bequest of her dying grandmother, young American Evan Hughes arrives at Emma's magnificent English clothing store, Hartes, only to find out that Emma has long since died. She is soon hired as a store assistant to Linnet O'Neill, Emma's great-granddaughter, who can't help but notice the American's resemblance to her own mother, Paula. Evan and Gideon Harte, Paula's cousin, fall in love amid whispers that Evan might be the descendant of one of Emma's husbands. The truth lies in Emma's diary, but Paula is reluctant to read it. Curiosity finally gets the better of her, and the journal takes Paula to Emma's life during World War II, and at least partially answers the family's questions about Evan's heritage. It is up to Paula to figure out the rest. Readers new to the series might have a hard time getting a handle on the large cast of characters and their relationships to each other, but those familiar with Emma Harte and her large family will feel right at home. Kristine HuntleyCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

A classic from the renowned Japanese novelist about isolation and the threat of a nuclear holocaust, The Ark Sakura is as timely today as it was at its original publication. In this Kafkaesque allegorical fantasy, Mole has converted a huge underground quarry into an “ark” capable of surviving the coming nuclear holocaust and is now in search of his crew. He falls victim, however, to the wiles of a con man-cum-insect dealer. In the surreal drama that ensues, the ark is invaded by a gang of youths and a sinister group of elderly people called the Broom Brigade, led by Mole's odious father, while Mole becomes trapped in the ark's central piece of equipment, a giant toilet powerful enough to flush almost anything, including chopped-up humans, out to sea.

A Truly Yours Digital Edition. . .All men are just the same. And Christy Conners can give plenty of real-life examples! She's seen her own father betray her mother, and she's seen her own heart broken into little pieces. No, Christy has decided never to trust a man again. A former fashion model, Christy has decided love only exists in fairy tales, and for those who believe in fairy-tale endings. That's why she's pouring all her energy into creating the exclusive, one-of-a-kind wedding gowns that she will never wear. But when Curt Kyle enters Christy's clear-eyed world, her icy resolve begins to melt. Is Curt the man he seems to be, a man she can really trust? Christy's very life may depend on him.

After Danni McAllister and her family escaped from El Cobra and his kidnapping ring, they thought life would basically return to normal. Little did they know that their peril had just begun. As secrets from the past begin to unfold, it becomes evident that the motives driving the attacks on the McAllister family go much deeper than money—and they're not going to stop anytime soon. Now, as Danni faces evils even more sinister than before, she has to wonder if even the Guardian will be equal to the dangers ahead. The whole family will love this page-turning conclusion to the story of Le Gardien, the enchanted pouch that guides, protects, and teaches those who have it in their keeping.