Showing results by narrator "Cindy Kay" in All Categories

A summer heat wave is the worst of vampire baker Priscilla Pratt’s problems - until an anti-vampire religious sect shows up in town. Someone else comes knocking: a grumpy (though handsome) investigator who is suspicious Priscilla has been surrounded by so many murders recently. Avalon, Priscilla’s wacky fairy godmother, is causing a ruckus again, too. And finally - another murder, right under Priscilla’s nose, found dead on the steps of the church. Priscilla is the number-one suspect, and everyone seems to want to do her in.

There’s a body in the bakery. It’s the day of the annual Bellmare parade, and so the last thing Priscilla Pratt wants is a dead body in her bakery. Bad luck on that front. The murder victim had plenty of enemies, Priscilla quickly learns, and she’ll have to sort fact from fiction among the suspects. Was it his disgruntled boss? A werewolf foe? The furious ex-wife? Or was it Priscilla’s young apprentice vampire, who was found in the middle of the crime scene? Can the best baker-vampire in New England catch a murderer before the murderer catches her?

Set in the fictional town of Steeplejack, nestled in the Bitterroot Mountains, Hazel Mackenzie provides law enforcement with sketch art and victim reconstruction following suspected crimes. Hazel is catapulted from observer to participant when her husband dies in an accident and then soon after, her gay twin brother Kento is shot by a member of Steeplejack's growing anti-LGBTQ community during a gender reveal party for his child.

When Joo Hong harvests a beautiful persimmon from her mom’s garden, she can’t wait to give it to her Grandma who is visiting from far away. However, the days leading up to her arrival feel like forever—and the persimmon is looking less and less perfect as time passes by. What can Joo Hong do to make sure it’s perfectly ripe—and not mushy and wrinkly—for Grandma’s visit?

When Cindy moves to Thailand with her husband and teenage son, she finds herself strangely adrift in a foreign culture, unprepared for the challenges she encounters there. On an impulse, she signs up for a conference where she unexpectedly meets a Thai Buddhist nun, Venerable Dhammananda Bhikkhuni, who leads her on a spiritual journey from which there is no turning back. Along the way, she discovers the beauty of the Thai people and culture.

These 75 flash nonfiction pieces, written by internationally celebrated women authors and dazzlingly hilarious newcomers, are no flashes in the pan: They provide a feast of insights, generously garnished with wit, spice, and an exhilarating attention to craft. In Fast Funny Women, you'll find everything you want from thoughtful essays in a short, delicious form. Perfect for students of writing, writers of humor, and all fans who welcome laughter, insight, and perspective into their lives.

Multiple times a day, in cities across the US and beyond, a simple yet powerful message is repeated by the well-meaning, the ignorant, and the bigoted: “don’t go”—avoid at all costs those Black and Brown disinvested neighborhoods that have become bywords for social disorder and urban decay. This book is a collection of intimate stories that uncover the hidden influence of both subtle and overt “don’t go” messages and the segregation they perpetuate in Chicago.

Marie Xiao lives a double life, moonlighting as a freelance consultant in corporate Seattle even as she dedicates herself—and her powers as a witch—to chasing down objects of myth and magic before they can be used to harm humankind. She carefully guards the bridges between worlds and has never once been tempted to stray. Until she catches the eye of a pair-bonded kitsune and kumiho and her whole world is thrown into chaos.

Trillionaire Igbal Renz has constructed a starship capable of making the twentyyear journey to Alpha Centauri. So why is he stopping at barely one-tenth that distance, with a cargo of a hundred frozen scientists and diplomats? Rumors abound that Renz Ventures, Inc., has made contact with … something.

Harlem stalwart Monroe Webb is reluctantly drawn to cheeky newcomer Annie Wu, who has moved in across the hall. Annie knows that Monroe opposed her bid for a space in his building, but she can't help but be fascinated by his style and his dedication to local causes. Can these neighbors mend fences or are they better off breaking them down?

I might be a werewolf. But I am a paramedic. It goes deeper than the adrenaline rush of the life or death calls. Every call no matter how minor, lets me end a shift with the knowledge that yes, I helped someone today. Except I cannot help anyone when people are shooting at me! Slade Hutchson, the rabble-rousing son of a bitch, is back in the city with a new job. The supernatural correspondent for a local TV station. A position he's using to poison the entire city against me.

Oof! After solving the case of the Royal Rumpus, Olive Cobin Zang and her elite team of underdogs are on top of the world. As the awkward, crime-fighting Misfits, they’re acing every mission thrown at them from NOCK (aka No One Can Know, the covert agency they work for). But when their classmate Zeke starts receiving threatening notes, the Misfits are stumped. They’re no strangers to danger, but this case is a total head-scratcher. Who would target kind, friendly Zeke . . . unless he’s not what he seems to be?

Dr. Hannah Bryers, anthropology professor and forensics expert at the prestigious Mad River University, takes pleasure in examining corpses, but small talk and living people fill her with dread. When she’s not teaching, she analyzes the decomposing flesh of murder victims around the globe.

Sabine is working on a mixed-species spaceship when it abruptly comes under attack by a strange monster. When she encounters Eirlys, a set, they manage to hide together and survive the assault. They're soon rescued by Naomi, captain of a mercenary ship which was hired to kidnap the two survivors but at the last minute chose to rescue them instead—putting them, Naomi, and her crew in peril from the government who hired them. And if being wanted wasn't enough, the monster is still out there.

Two months after her eighteenth birthday, scrappy Hikari Skye is ready to leave her ramshackle mobile home on Earth for icy dwarf planet Ceres and the underground bases that house Space Force. She's trading her dingy trailer park; her baby sister, Bea; and her best friend, Rho, for the excitement of the Proxy Wars and the freedom of the galactic front lines—where her father once deserted his own platoon. And the most appealing part? She's leaving behind Draeden Rache, the cocky, privileged bully who tried to kiss her last year.

Nev Bourne is a hotshot programmer for the latest and greatest tech invention out there: SavePoint, the brain implant that rewinds the seconds of all our most embarrassing moments. She’s been working non-stop on the next rollout, even blowing off her boyfriend, her best friend and her family to make SavePoint 2.0. But when she hits go on the test-run, she wakes up the next day only to discover it's yesterday. She's falling backwards in time, one day at a time. As things spiral out of control, a long-lost friend from college reappears in her life claiming they know how to save her.

Just like people, there are so many ways a city can be. And this lively book explores all of them. From quiet and dreamy to bright and buzzing, the magnificent diversity of our world is celebrated by connecting the uniqueness of its places with the people who live in them. Wild, gritty, bookish, or sheltering—if you were a city, how would YOU be?

In the daytime, in a meadow, sits a single rock, casting a single shadow, named Greem. He’d really like someone to talk to. But who? He writes one word on his lonely rock: “Hi” and hopes someone will see it. Sure enough, in the darkness of night, Shinbi finds the note! But who could have written it?

Granny may be old, but she’s certainly not feeble—or idle! She’s built a splendid vegetable garden from scratch on the rooftop of her Chengdu apartment building. She collects thrown-away produce to feed her animals or make compost for the garden. She waters, weeds, and shows the neighborhood kids how to care for her plants: with love, patience, and pride. Come harvest time, Granny gathers her fresh produce and cooks up a delicious feast for her friends and family. She even sends them off with extra bags of goodies so people can make their own yummy, healthy meals at home!

There's nothing like two pretty American girls to take Daniel Cunha's mind off his troubles: getting dumped by his pregnant girlfriend; his cirrhotic grandfather dropping dead the day before; the looming anniversary, on New Year's Eve, of the raid that doomed his drug-dealing aunt and uncle; and his long-gone mother, escaped to States with another American fool like his father. But a cold bottle of cachaça and a pair of flirty turistas to is all Daniel needs to feel like turning up.