Short Family

Motherhood isn’t always what’s expected. One woman may delight in navigating the unknowable, while another may look to the past to chart the course ahead. Still another may have the urge to redefine the relationship between mother and child. For each, the journey can be heartwarming and heartbreaking, ever changing and challenging. In these provocative stories, acclaimed authors probe the growing pains that can change the lives of both mother and child in ways they never imagined.

When a snowstorm pummels the western half of the country, three couples find once off-limits love just in time for Christmas. An unforgettable holiday anthology from best-selling authors Jennifer Ryan, Maisey Yates, and Lia Riley.

After many happy years of marriage and raising a family, Brian and Kathleen suddenly find themselves a bit lost in life. Midwesterners who've never traveled, Kathleen decides that what she and Brian need is a vacation, and she plans a trip to Ireland in search of her roots. In beautiful, quaint Lisdoonvarna, to the couple's surprise, they find themselves in the midst of a joyous yearly gathering, and they rediscover something much more important than evidence of long-dead ancestors: their love for each other and for life itself.

A stolen Desert Eagle, a weapon designed to protect warriors defending their nations, the official sidearm of the Israeli military, continues its fall from grace in LA misadventures.

These 12 stories - published over the last five years in Harper's, The Best American Short Stories, McSweeney's, Playboy, and other publications - veer from comic tales of love to social satire to suspenseful crime fiction, from hip Portland to once-hip Seattle to never-hip Spokane, from a condemned casino in Las Vegas to a bottomless lake in the dark woods of Idaho. This is a world of lost fathers and redemptive conmen, of meth tweakers on desperate odysseys and men committing suicide by fishing.

From the number-one best-selling author of Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas and Sundays at Tiffany's, two heartwarming tales about the power of a good story to open our eyes to life's possibilities.

That summer - more than 10 years ago, while they were still in high school - Noelle McDowell and Thomas Sutton fell secretly in love. Secretly because their mothers had been locked in a bitter feud for decades. But despite the animosity between Sarah McDowell and Mary Sutton, Noelle planned to elope with Thom. Until he jilted her.

An exquisite new collection from a Pulitzer Prize-winning master of the short story, the culmination of a five-decade career: work that takes us beneath the placid surface of suburban life into the elusive strangeness of the everyday.

In Meet Me at the Emotional Baggage Claim, the mother-daughter duo of Lisa Scottoline and Francesca Serritella continue the conversation with more hilarious and honest tales of life inside an ordinary, extraordinary family. These stories will make you laugh, cry, and call your mother, daughter, and all your girlfriends.

Sevastiano Cantarelli can barely believe Amy Taylor is real. After the lifetime of betrayal he’s experienced, her surprising sweetness is the ultimate threat to his cynical worldview! Unwrapping her innocence was a gift he couldn’t forget...but one he knows it wouldn’t be fair to repeat. Their encounter left Amy exhilarated - and wanted for the first time. She knows that walking away from the commanding Italian is the safest way to keep her heart intact. Yet it’s the one thing she can’t do...because she’s pregnant with Sevastiano’s twins!

Alright, you know how the saying goes: "Sharing is caring," right? Well, get ready because this story is a banger! It dives deep into the vault of my childhood memories, and trust me, it's a doozy. We all have those formative experiences that shape who we are, but mine... well, let's just say my mother took a slightly different approach to parenting. Instead of the stereotypical, overflowing-with-affection kind of motherly love, I drew the short straw and got myself a narcissist. Think back to those moments of pure, unadulterated childhood pride. Remember that time you brought home a ...

Tiny and helpless, the abandoned newborn that venture capitalist Marcus Warren finds during a morning run takes him by surprise. So does the sudden longing for his capable assistant, Liberty Reese, who reveals her tender side with the baby.

In The Girl of the Lake, Bill Roorbach conjures vivid, complex characters whose layered interior worlds feel at once familiar and extraordinary.

Zach and his man of the house James don’t have the most typical relationship – in fact, it’s far from normal. Zach loves letting the man who raised him give it to him hard and rough, and James loves sharing his boy with all his hunky friends! Road tripping across America, the two of them stop at a roadside rest stop in the middle of nowhere. Instead of a quick bathroom break, the two step hunks get a taste of how long-haul truckers satisfy all their pent up primal urges while on the road – hard and nasty in the truck stop restroom! This smoking hot gay menage romance story will ...

It’s 1974 in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, and 15-year-old Justine grows up in a family of tough, complicated, and loyal women, presided over by her mother, Lula, and Granny. After Justine’s father abandoned the family, Lula became a devout member of the Holiness Church - a community that Justine at times finds stifling and terrifying. But Justine does her best as a devoted daughter, until an act of violence sends her on a different path forever.

A book about life, travel, survival, and awareness of mistakes. Escape to Myself is the first book in the Big Little Stories series by Ukrainian writer Ivan Kuznietsov. Each book in the series is an independent, complete story and can be read in a free sequence. All stories have something in common—they are all about change. You will discover the adventures of different characters, but all of them, just like you and me, are essential parts of the big little story of our world. This book tells the story about a conscious transition from the life of a highly respected person, the heir to ...

A promise of love, a miracle, and a treat that will tie your heart into knots! Let's begin with introducing you to the grumpiest Scrooge around – Army Veteran and former medic, Houghton. The gruff man served many tours in Afghanistan, but one thing can bring him to his knees faster than a foreign enemy. His wife, Jill. Except there is a problem. Now, the couple is facing a twist in their hard-earned Happily Ever After that neither expected, threatening the secret he's kept for months now. When the cookie crumbles, how do you pick up the pieces, realizing that things are still incredibly ...

The Against All Odds series is a romantic comedy saga with lots of humor and some angst.

In Polygamy: A Very Short Introduction, Sarah M.S. Pearsall explores what plural marriages reveal about the inner workings of marriage and describes the controversies surrounding it. The book emphasizes the diversity of historical polygamist societies, from the Shi'ite Muslims and Wendat men who practiced short-term marriages to the Mixteca, Maori, Inca, Algonquin, and Marta indigenous people of North America and the Pacific Islands. Pearsall also explains the divides within Christianity that led to Joseph Smith's establishment of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Omnibus is an engrossing ride through Jo’s wacky world. There are articles and stories on ski jumps, drumming, music and dogs; even Mary Poppins gets a mention. There’s a friend lost, then found, then slowly lost again as his mind begins to crumble – thank goodness we shared some laughs in days gone by. There’s even a set of Antlers and my favourite aeroplane, the S71 Blackbird at the Imperial War Museum, Duxford, England. And then there’s the odd ride on a bus! No ordinary journey this. Many years ago, following some dire health issues, Jo and wife Jan discarded their long-term ...