Small Life

Karissa Newcomb is ready for a new start in a new neighborhood, as far away as she can get from Seattle, where her husband cheated on her with the neighbor who was supposed to be her best friend. She and her nine-year-old daughter are moving on to the city of Gig Harbor on the bay in Puget Sound. She even has a new job as an assistant at a small publishing company right in Gig Harbor. Her new boss seems like a bit of a curmudgeon, but a job is a job, she loves to read, and the idea of possibly meeting writers sounds fabulous.

In 1986, fresh out of college, Paul Downs opened his first and last business: a small company that built custom furniture. With no idea how to run a business or how to build custom furniture, Downs spent a year teaching himself the business, and in 1987 he hired his first employee. That was when things got complicated.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "The twists come at you at breakneck pace. Very suspenseful." (Goodreads) When two young boys disappear while riding their bikes, Detective Charlotte Pierce must follow the clues to find their killer before he strikes again. In the dusty outskirts of Mesquite County, California, two kids go missing, taken from outside their homes. The quiet desert community is devastated and it’s up to Charlotte to find out what happened. The FBI is called in and a man who stalked and terrorized Charlotte comes back into her life. She kept his secret to protect her career, but is now being...

Sadie may be married now, but she's as spirited as ever, and her life is no less tame. In fact, soon after she and Mark are settled into the farmhouse Mark is renovating, she's visited by three FBI agents who question her about the two children who mysteriously appeared one day at the ranch. Before the agents leave, they warn Sadie that her beloved horse, Paris, is highly valuable, and that she and Mark may be in grave danger because of Paris.

Meri's family has been producing doctors for so many generations that no one remembers why, so when she flunks out of medical school, she runs as far from her parents as she can get. In the small mountain town of Canyon Mines, Colorado, she takes a job at the Inn at Hidden Run B&B. And waits. It's only a matter of time. What she doesn't count on is genealogist Jillian Parisi-Duffy and her father, Nolan, having her back when it takes everything she has not to bolt again but to stay and face the truth that only unfolding her family's history will reveal....

Ethan thought his beachside home would be a calm escape. Instead, it’s overflowing with gorgeous, chaotic, and irresistible women who’ve turned his quiet routine into something else entirely. With growing temptation, new career choices, and no privacy to speak of, he’s about to find out just how complicated paradise can get.

A Secret Service agent devotes his life to protecting the people he serves…until one day he realizes that the person who needs protecting is him. Henry Banks is a former Marine, a career Secret Service agent, and the only man allowed into the Shipwreck Key book club full of women. He’s like a handsome brick wall who doesn’t show emotion, but he’s finally let his guard down—just a little bit—to let Sunday Bond in. Banks and the former Second Lady have been dating for a few months, but now that they’re in their fifties and both divorced once, the dating dance has become more ...

In AA they say that addictions will take you to hospitals, Mental Institutions and Prisons. It's true. They will. I have been in all of those places because of my addictions. But addictions are not responsible for the life I lead entirely, and certainly not responsible for the things I did. I may have used because I believe it solved problems, or to cover pain, but the decisions I made, I made because I wanted to make them. Because I chose to make them. This is about the life that I lead that took me down the path of addiction that ruled almost all of my life. Although my addictions were ...

The Lowcountry of South Carolina is where By Invitation Only begins, at a barbecue engagement party thrown by Diane English Stiftel, her brother Floyd, and her parents to celebrate her son’s engagement. On this gorgeous, magical night, the bride’s father, Alejandro Cambria, a wealthy power broker whose unbelievably successful career in private equity made him one of Chicago’s celebrated elite, discovers the limits and possibilities of cell phone range.

Jane Tanner’s friends are settling down, while she’s been settling for less. She longs for adventure and the big city, but caring for her ailing grandfather means she's shackled to her small town. She’s excited her vintage gift shop is finally up and running, but it’s not enough. Longing to fulfill at least one dream—to become a mother before her biological clock ticks out—Jane drunkenly propositions the worst possible candidate for Dad.

New York City meets small-town charm in this laugh-out-loud romantic comedy about second chances, family secrets, and unexpected sparks. Ashley Winters doesn’t do small towns, or flowers, for that matter. But when her free-spirited grandmother takes a nasty fall in her beloved Maple Ridge flower shop, Ashley begrudgingly trades skyscrapers for sunsets to help out for the summer. Despite her utter lack of gardening skills and a black thumb that could kill a cactus, Ashley sees this as her chance to finally connect with the grandmother her parents kept at arm’s length her entire childhood...

If you love Christmas, love mountains and lakes, and love small communities filled with good friends, you'll find them all here in this Huckleberry Lake duet! Enjoy the hope, healing, love, and peace of a Christmas visit to the lake in these two faith-filled novellas, as two couple grow, learn, and change with God's help, until they can open their hearts to their lifetime loves! Calm & Bright Will Brad and Maddie let God use a Christmas together for the sake of their son to help them rediscover the love that led to their whirlwind romance, and overcome the issues that caused their divorce? ...

The Miller family's move from Ohio to Montana was, for the most part, uneventful, except that Sadie Miller had to leave her beloved horse, the palomino named Paris. Still, she likes the Montana snows and her job at Aspen East Ranch, serving the ranch hands. Unexpectedly, Ezra appears, the man who seems to be perfect in every way and fully intends to marry Sadie. But does she love him back? And who is this fascinating Mark who helps to rescue a dying horse and shows up at the Amish hymn-sing though he is English?

Do you feel like you're living a smaller life than you deserve? If you grew up with criticism, trauma, or neglect, you may have learned to survive by making yourself invisible. Don't challenge anyone. Don't try too hard. Don't attract attention. Stay off the radar, and you'll be safe. But what protected you then now imprisons you. This survival strategy becomes self-suppression—and it's keeping you stuck. In "Breaking Free," you'll discover how childhood coping mechanisms transform into adult patterns that limit your relationships, career, health, and happiness. More importantly, you'll ...

Mercy lives in modern-day Pietermaritzburg, South Africa with her eccentric foster aunts - two elderly sisters so poor, they can only afford one lightbulb. A nasty housing developer is eying their house. And that same house suddenly starts falling apart - just as Aunt Flora starts falling apart. She's forgetting words, names, and even how to behave in public. Mercy tries to keep her head down at school so nobody notices her. But when a classmate frames her for stealing the school's raffle money, Mercy's teachers decide to take a closer look at her home life.

Steven Kotler was 40 years old, single, and facing an existential crisis when he met Lila, a woman devoted to animal rescue. "Love me, love my dogs" was her rule, and Steven took it to heart. Spurred to move by a housing crisis in Los Angeles, Steven, Lila, and their eight dogs - then 10, then 20, and then they lost count - bought a postage-stamp-size farm in Chimayo, New Mexico....

Shaken by her parents’ divorce and discouraged by the growing chasm between herself and her serious boyfriend, Nikki Werner seeks solace at her uncle’s farm in a small Missouri hamlet. She’ll spend the summer there, picking up the pieces of her shattered present so she can plan a better future. But what awaits her at the ancestral farm is the past—one she barely knows.

Chief of Police Ed Kapenash is about to retire. Blond Sharon is going through a divorce. But when a 22-million-dollar summer home is purchased by the mysterious Richardsons—how did they make their money, exactly?—Ed, Sharon, and everyone in the community are swept up in high drama. The Richardsons throw lavish parties, flirt with multiple locals, flaunt their wealth with not one but two yachts, and raise impossible hopes of everyone they meet. When their house burns to the ground and their most essential employee goes missing, the entire island is up in arms.

Barns are burning in Amish author Linda Byler's second book in the Lancaster Burning series, and no one knows who's doing it or why. Can Sarah Beiler end the terror that is pulling apart her community, even as her own heart is pulled between two young men? Sarah Beiler's barn was the first to burn, and it was quickly followed by two other barn fires.

Are you shy? Are you introverted? Do you suffer from social anxiety? Do you want to make more friends? Do you want to have better relationships? We are all told that saying, "Hello" can go a long way. But is a friendly greeting really enough to give our social lives the kind of boost that we are looking for? Social Skills Can Improve Your Life Whether you wish to have success with relationships, friendships, or business encounters, social skills are very important to have. You will learn: *How to prevent social anxiety from controlling your life *Which conversation topics to focus on *Which...