Showing results by narrator "Suzanne Elise Freeman" in All Categories

When Alberta Scaglione and her black cat, Lola, stumble across a tree house hidden in the trees and a dead body underneath it, they take a detour from their morning jog into solving a murder. Now, the Ferrara ladies will have to exercise extreme caution to avoid a permanent decline in their health....

Hazel has just moved into a trailer park of senior citizens, with her father and Diane: his sex doll companion. Life with Hazel's father is strained at best, but it's got to be better than her marriage to dominating tech billionaire, Byron Gogol. For over a decade, Hazel has been quarantining in Byron's family compound, her every movement and vital sign tracked. So when Byron demands to wirelessly connect the two of them via brain chips, turning Hazel into a human guinea pig, Hazel makes a run for it. Will Hazel be able to free herself from Byron's virtual clutches before he finds her?

In You Will Never Be Forgotten, Mary South explores how technology can both collapse our relationships from within and provide opportunities for genuine connection. Formally inventive, darkly absurdist, savagely critical of the increasingly fraught cultural climates we inhabit, these 10 stories also find hope in fleeting interactions and moments of tenderness. They reveal our grotesque selfishness and our intense need for love and acceptance, and the psychic pain that either shuts us off or allows us to discover our deepest reaches of empathy.

1947. Fires are racing along the coast of Maine after a summer-long drought, ravaging thousands of acres, causing unprecedented confusion and fear. Five months pregnant, Grace Holland is left alone to protect her two toddlers when her difficult and unpredictable husband, Gene, joins the volunteers fighting to bring the fire under control. Along with her best friend, Rosie, and Rosie's two young children, the women watch in horror as their houses go up in flames, then walk into the ocean as a last resort.

Raven can breathe life into you, or siphon the life from you - the choice is yours. They say your life flashes before your eyes when you die. But what you didn't know - your last thoughts determine whether Raven becomes your grim reaper or your saving grace. Death has a sinister plan, but his favorite female reaper has been given a new power that will combat his secret mission. The only issue - she hasn't discovered it yet. Will Raven put the pieces together in time, or will Purgatory be destroyed forever?

After surviving the battle that erupted after Lo and the Bosha clan attacked, now Mya is looking ahead to her future with Kol. All the things that once felt so uncertain to her are finally falling into place. But the same night as Kol and Mya's betrothal announcement, Mya's brother Chev reveals his plan to marry their youngest sister, Lees, to his friend Morsk. The only way to avoid this terrible turn of events, Morsk informs Mya when he corners her later, is for Mya to take Lees' place and marry him herself.

Finally, Brienna is a mistress of knowledge and is settling into her role as the daughter of Davin MacQuinn, a disgraced lord who returned to Maevana to reclaim his house. Though she’s just survived a revolution, one that will finally return a queen to the throne, she faces another difficult challenge. She must prove herself trustworthy to the MacQuinns. But as Queen Isolde Kavanagh’s closest confidante, she’ll have to balance serving her father’s house as well as her country. And then there’s Cartier Evariste, a wholly separate factor in her new life.

Addison should be ecstatically happy, she’s about to marry a wonderful man. But something is wrong—she doesn’t know who she really is. A year ago, she was found bleeding on the side of the road, unable to remember how she got there. Or her own name. Or if she has a family.

The Christodora is home to Milly and Jared, a privileged young couple with artistic ambitions. Their neighbour, Hector, a Puerto Rican gay man who was once a celebrated AIDS activist but is now a lonely addict, becomes connected to Milly's and Jared's lives in ways none of them can anticipate. Meanwhile, the couple's adopted son, Mateo, grows to appreciate the opportunities for both self-realization and oblivion that New York offers.

Gina Perini manages a bookstore in one of San Francisco's most lively neighborhoods. Although she thrives in her world of books, her harrowing escape from the war in the Balkans years earlier remains fresh in her mind. There are still those who are searching for her and who are intent on vengeance. Gina suddenly gets news that someone from her past is still alive - someone she had given up hope of finding. This sets in motion a chain of events that will stretch across the country and push her love and resourcefulness to the limit.

This novel-length story collection includes Melissa Marr's 2019 and 2020 short fiction (all previously published in magazines, anthology, or ebook), including the new Wicked Lovely Stories "Love Hurts", "Summer Bound", and "Winter Dreams", as well as "Nameless", "Changing Guards", "The Devil's Due", and "Knee Deep in the Sea" and "Of Roses and Kings."

Dr. Dylan Michels has worked hard for a perfect life, so when her longtime boyfriend, Cooper, gets down on one knee, it should be the most perfect moment of all. Then why does she say no? For too many years, Dylan's been living for her sister, who never got the chance to grow up. But her attempts to be the perfect daughter, perfect partner, and perfect doctor haven't been enough to silence the haunting guilt Dylan feels over her sister's death - and the role no one knows she played in it.

Eighteen-year-old Serenity Ashdown has a brilliant mind: She counts, calculates, and analyzes everything, all the time. Awkward. When her father suddenly disappears, Serenity follows his trail to a parallel dimension. The feds on the other side claim to want to help her go home, if she helps them reconstruct the right codes for the portal between worlds. But it’s soon clear they want something more: a gateway for invasion, because this version of Earth is dying.

When single mom and computer security specialist Kate Ford is suddenly and mysteriously put on administrative leave, she finds herself drawn into the drama of a lurid kidnapping case with ties to her company. Kate has enough on her plate dealing with a condition that leaves her extra-sensitive to stimuli, but the case is too juicy to leave untouched.

When shots are fired, bodies turn cold. Detective Andrea Mainiero knows this all too well when a squad of home invaders raid her house after a night of lovemaking. Her boyfriend is gunned down and her old friend, Lacy Barret, goes missing. Andrea and her smooth-talking partner, Bret Gamble, must shuffle through the clues of a series of crimes to discover Lacy's kidnapper.

When the Colonial Marines set out after their deadliest prey, the Xenomorphs, it’s what Corporal Hicks calls a bug hunt—kill or be killed. Here are fifteen all-new stories of such “close encounters,” written by many of today’s most extraordinary authors. Set during the events of all four Alien films, sending the Marines to alien worlds, to derelict space settlements, and into the nests of the universe’s most dangerous monsters, these adventures are guaranteed to send the blood racing—one way or another.

Olivia Logan has a plan: win back her ex by making him see what he’s missing! First she needs to find a man who’s willing to play along. With his laid-back cowboy charm, Luke Hollister is an unlikely hero - but he wants her help convincing her father to sell him land, which means he needs her as much as she needs him. Good girl Olivia has always been off limits to Luke. So why does she get to him like no-one else? Luke‘s supposed to help her win back another man...not keep her in his arms. But now that he has her there, he’s not sure he wants to let go.

Cowboy Caleb Dalton has loved single mom Ellie Bell, and her little daughter, Amelia, for years. But since Ellie is his best friend's widow, Caleb's head knows Ellie will always be strictly off-limits. If only his heart got the memo. So when Caleb discovers that Ellie has a Christmas wish list—and hopes for a kiss under the mistletoe—he's throwing his cowboy hat into the ring. If anyone's going to be kissing Ellie and sharing this magical time with her and her daughter, it's him.

Grant Dodge didn’t expect to find a woman sleeping in an abandoned cabin on his family ranch. Or to find her so intriguing. Unlike every other woman in town, McKenna Tate doesn’t know Grant’s a widower. With only a suitcase, McKenna came to Gold Valley to confront her birth father. She didn’t plan to work at the Dodge ranch or fall for the gorgeous cowboy who keeps his heart roped off. But there’s no denying the way their broken pieces fit together. Hope brought her to Gold Valley—but will it be the gift that could finally heal them both?

From an acclaimed and original writer comes a new collection of stories bursting with absurdist plot twists and laced with trenchant wit. The title story delivers a cringingly biting dissection of racial attitudes in contemporary America, and Clarke also turns his eagle eye to subjects like PTSD, the fate of child actors, and, most especially, marital discord in stories like "Considering Lizzie Borden, Her Axe, My Wife" and "The Misunderstandings".