Showing results by narrator "Maria McCann" in All Categories

Avery Stone will do anything to have the family she didn't have growing up—even marry a man she doesn't love. Or at least that was the plan until she woke up on her wedding day with feet so cold she might as well name them Elsa…from Frozen, get it? After asking her deceased Grammy for a sign that she is doing the right thing, she receives a news alert on her phone announcing the newest cast member of Fairytale Love, who just happens to be the man she shared the best two weeks of her life with five years earlier and who she's loved and pined after ever since.

Faydra "Spider" Green has had a storied career as a navy lawyer, juggling being the daughter of a former US president. She has successfully navigated complex diplomatic situations, pulse-pounding legal investigations, and dangerous military missions, managing each time to save the day. But now, a man who had nearly cost Fay her life has seemingly returned from the dead. Now, hell-bent on revenge, he poses a threat to Fay and national security. Fay will have to go to extraordinary lengths to stop him, even tampering with the bounds of time and space.

Coexisting with a demon is going to take more than a meditation playlist and good intentions. These days, I’m training hard core. My only accessories are bladed weapons and bruised ribs. It’s a price I’m willing to pay if it means staying in control.

Some women settle for charm bracelets. I get a murder of crows tattooed on my body. And that's the good news. After sending a demon back to hell, I thought I'd have a few weeks to kick back with my girls, go on that hot date with a certain stony-eyed enforcer, maybe even catch an outdoor concert or two. When witches start turning up dead, the Tribunal calls in a favor that lands me in the middle of a supernatural murder investigation. Again. When that search intertwines with a decade-old trail into my sister's death, there is nothing I won’t do to get answers.

After serving his country for twenty years, the retired Navy SEAL was footloose and fancy-free. He wanted to travel and reconnect with family. One of his first stops was to spend the summer visiting his brother and cousin. Three months in Whisper Lake, and then he'd be on to his next adventure. Nothing was going to derail his plans. Not even a stunning, smart, sarcastic Sofia Vergara look-alike who made him want things he'd never wanted before.

Ellie Weatherby and the four other grandmothers living at Sanderling Cove decide with only two great-grandchildren, it’s time to swing into action. They invite their grandchildren to spend the summer at the cove, hoping to encourage romance between them. Ellie invites all three of her granddaughters to take over the management of the Sanderling Cove Inn so that she and her bridegroom can spend the time traveling in Europe for their honeymoon.

How fast can charity fundraiser CeCe Barclay’s unimpeachable society life come tumbling down? One minute she’s speaking before Chicago’s glitterati. The next, her financier husband is wanted for embezzlement. Her assets seized and her fall mortifyingly public, CeCe grasps for refuge—and employment—as a sorority housemom at Eli Whitney University, her daughter Hayden’s alma mater.

In 1940, art-world icon Georgia O'Keeffe bought a house in a mountain-rimmed New Mexico desert, planning to live there for six months every year. To manage her remote household while she paints, O'Keeffe invited Maria Chabot—a young and naïve would-be writer—to join her. Their tempestuous relationship endured throughout the chaotic years of WW2, the death of Georgia's domineering, philandering husband (Alfred Stieglitz), and Maria's design and building of a remarkable adobe house and studio for the artist in the native village of Abiquiu—a generous gift from an exceptional friend.

When the Bough Breaks presents a breakthrough concept of mourning, documenting the process of evolution from initial grief to an altered outlook on life. Excerpts from interviews with fifty parents who lost a child from age five to forty-five trace the road from utter devastation to a revised view of life, resulting in a work that is a tribute to resilience and the indomitable human spirit.

Well, Evie doesn't want to find out! Evie Jones is a widow of three years, with an eighteen-year-old daughter. Struggling to simplify her life and trying desperately to convince her daughter not to leave the nest. And her 'No Dating' rule is part of that struggle. So is selling her big house and moving into something smaller. To help with that plan, she hires a handsome contractor to complete her partially finished basement.

Missy’s life was at a crossroads. Divorced, alone, and needing a fresh start, she took a position at a small college in the California mountains as an associate theater professor. Yet, her future still felt very uncertain. The last thing on her mind was finding love again, and she never expected to find it with another woman.

Why did they come? When they appeared across the sky, speculation wheeled around the world—the aliens were from heaven, the invaders were from hell… or they were proof that neither existed. But when they landed, curiosity gave way to suspicion and the nations reacted with nuclear force, setting off a chain reaction that left the world in ruins. Twenty years later, instead of nearing her retirement, Dr. Elspeth Darrow struggles to forget the loss of her child and husband by plunging herself into the work of operating the last remaining hospital in San Francisco.

Chloe Chadwick’s last remaining family member, her grandmother, dies in a car accident and leaves her a letter that changes everything Chloe thought she knew about herself. The letter directs her to Salus, an island off the coast of Connecticut that can’t be found on any map. When she arrives, she learns that she’s a part of a secret world living alongside humanity, one consisting of magic, shape-shifters, and elementals, where the Greek gods aren’t just believed in, they’re actually present. But within 24 hours of her arrival, a man is murdered, and Chloe is the suspect.

In Bedside Witness, Adams shares stories from her 20-year journey in hospice, geriatric mental health, palliative care, and dementia coaching. Through the intimate lens as a social worker, Kay artfully draws us into these heartfelt tales as if she were sitting with us at our kitchen table, tenderly weaving the laughter, grief, wonder, wisdom, and tragedy of our shared human experience.

“I am opposed to heart disease and cancer the way one is opposed to sin.” With that as her battle cry, health activist and philanthropist Mary Woodard Lasker had a singular goal: saving lives by increasing medical research. Together with her husband, advertising genius Albert, they created the Lasker Foundation, bestowing the Lasker Awards. But the real increase in medical research funding occurred when Mary discovered a revolutionary source: the federal government. “I’m just a catalytic agent,” she would insist, while she tirelessly lobbied Congress and presidents alike.

A shy young fairy, named Pansy, longs to have exciting adventures. One day while in the forest with her friend, Lightning the firefly, she loses track of the time and is very late for dinner. In her hurry to get home, she becomes lost in the dark and meets a strange creature. When this happens, she discovers an old secret that could threaten the safety of her town.

And She Was Never the Same Again is about you. It is about your family and your friends, everyone you've ever met, and all the strangers you have yet to meet. It takes you on a journey of gains and losses that stretch generations, cultures, identities, and decades of time. It awakens you to the inevitable and makes you look at things most people want to avoid seeing. It explores near-death experiences; medical, individual, and intergenerational trauma; the stigmatized death of a partner; perfectionism; athletics.

Welcome to Grapevine High, where fear, love, and self-discovery collide. FEAR introduces River, a curious freshman, and Xane, a charismatic girl with a secret—she’s a Synth, a synthetic human learning to understand emotions. As Xane grapples with the concept of fear, they both face bullying, high school drama, and the courage to step out of their comfort zones. This novella sets the stage for Xane's ongoing emotional journey, where each book delves deeper into her quest to master human emotions.

After raising twin girls as a single father and spending his days on construction sites, Ford was ready to live out his early retirement on his terms, which included solitude and fishing. So he ditched the big city, moved to a town the size of a postage stamp, and bought a house in the middle of nowhere without a neighbor in sight. His recluse plans hit a snag when the abandoned house down the road is suddenly inhabited by a woman who bears a striking resemblance to his childhood crush and her four kids.

In an unnamed Latin American country, a mysterious plague quickly spreads, erasing the memory of anyone infected. Angustias Romero flees with her family, but their flight is tragically cut short when she loses both her children. Consumed by grief, she finds herself within the hallucinatory expanse of Mezquite—a town corrupted by greed and populated by storytellers, refugees, and violent, predatory gangs. Here, Angustias is finally able to lay her children to rest at the Third Country, a cemetery run by the larger-than-life Visitación Salazar and a refuge beyond suffering and fear.