Small Life

In the tradition of his beloved first novel, The Notebook, number-one New York Times best-selling author Nicholas Sparks brings listeners the remarkable story of two couples whose lives intersect in profound and surprising ways.

Rachel Henderson’s family is falling apart. Becoming a widow — especially at this age — is heartbreaking. With her teenage daughter, Emma, leaving soon for college, Rachel needs a friend — but local diner owner Adam is the last person she ever thought she’d lean on. From the outside, her little sister, Anna, has a picture-perfect marriage. But the weight of it is suffocating her. The only way for her to breathe again comes at a high price, one she’s not so sure she can pay.

In Chia-Chia Lin’s debut, The Unpassing, we meet a Taiwanese immigrant family of six struggling to make ends meet on the outskirts of Anchorage, Alaska. The father, hardworking but beaten down, is employed as a plumber and repairman while the mother, a loving, strong-willed, and unpredictably emotional matriarch, holds the house together. When 10-year-old Gavin contracts meningitis at school, he falls into a deep, nearly fatal coma. He wakes up a week later to learn that his little sister Ruby was infected, too. She did not survive.

From the internationally bestselling author, keynote speaker and world-renowned business consultant, Nicola Cook, comes this specially expanded and updated 15-year anniversary edition of her powerful and life-changing book A New You. Is there something in your life that’s not working or something about yourself you’d like to change? You’re not alone. Almost all of us feel that way at some time or another.

As a toddler, Elodie Jacques was abandoned by her mother and left in the care of her French grandmother, Gabriella in Dartmouth, Devon. Now 24 years old, Elodie struggles to reconcile the deep anger for the mother she has never since seen. When Gabriella unexpectedly announces she wants the two of them to spend Christmas and her 70th birthday in her home town of Juan-les-Pins in the South of France, Elodie is thrilled. Gabriella meanwhile has her own ulterior motives for wanting to return after 40 years, a homecoming potentially filled with memories, secrets and recriminations.

From the outside, anyone would think that Lucy Palmer has it all: loving children, a dashing husband and a gorgeous home. But when her marriage to Michael comes to an abrupt and unexpected end, her life is turned upside down in a flash. As the truth of her marriage threatens to surface, Lucy seizes the opportunity to swap her house in London - and the stories it hides - for a rural escape to her parents' farmhouse in the Chilterns. But Lucy gets more than she bargained for when she moves back to her childhood home.

Willard Thrasher Card III, from Cardston, Alberta, Canada, embarks on an African adventure as a freshly minted development expert. His assignment to Malawi dissolves just as he makes the disastrous decision to start a business and move his young family to Africa with him. With the help of newfound African friends, his family moves to Zambia and stumbles their way through several business failures. Eventually, they find some success and recognize that Africa runs on a small balance of favors.

The German occupation is over. The Channel Islands, the only captured territory within the British Isles, are finally liberated. But the people of Jersey are left as scarred as the landscape. No longer a “summerland” holiday paradise, the island now boils with tension as locals seek revenge on anyone suspected of collaborating with the enemy during the war. Nineteen-year-old Jean Parris, still adjusting to this fractious peace, is shocked to learn that Hazel, a teacher who lives over her dad’s shop, may be responsible for her father’s wartime arrest.

Right after high school, Joe Goffman left sleepy Bush Falls, Connecticut, and never looked back. Then he wrote a novel savaging everything in town, a novel that became a national bestseller and a huge hit movie. Fifteen years later, Joe is struggling to avoid the sophomore slump with his next novel when he gets a call: his father's had a stroke, so it's back to Bush Falls for the town's most famous pariah. His brother avoids him, his former classmates beat him up, and the members of the book club just hurl their copies of Bush Falls at his house.

Seventeen-year-old Veronica "Ronnie" Miller's life was turned upside-down when her parents divorced and her father moved from New York City to Wilmington, North Carolina. Three years later, she remains angry and alienated from her parents, especially her father...until her mother decides it would be in everyone's best interest if she spent the summer in Wilmington with him. Ronnie's father, a former concert pianist and teacher, is living a quiet life in the beach town, immersed in creating a work of art that will become the centerpiece of a local church.

Midwife Jess is so used to helping other mums achieve their dreams that she’s put her own hopes of motherhood firmly on hold. After having her heart broken once before, Jess is determined to focus all she has on her small family and stepson Riley and make sure he feels safe, happy and loved. But when Jess is asked to care for a tiny baby and new mum in need of support, she’s torn. Jess wants to help, but she isn’t sure her battered heart could cope with saying goodbye to another baby she’s fallen in love with.

Take the first step towards regaining control of your creative life. What if you could take control of both your life and your creative career, avoid recurring cycles of stress and burnout, and create the optimal conditions for your potential to flourish? The good news is you can, and Mindful Creative will show you how to cultivate mindful presence and develop resilience.

At nine years of age, Logan Weber knows the routine. Keep quiet, make the food last, and don’t ever cause trouble. He’ll do what it takes to evade the rages of his troubled, violent father. Even though he’s only a child, Logan already knows too much - has seen too much. So when the opportunity presents itself, Logan runs. He has no idea where his journey will lead, or that the grandmother he’s been told is dead is desperately searching for him. Alone with no home of his own, Logan looks for a safe place to hide.

When Brid Harcus is sent to the Orkney Islands, in the far reaches of Scotland, she has high hopes for her trip being short, straightforward and lucrative. Her mother has inherited a cottage from her Great Aunt Jennet which has been unlived in and unloved for decades, and the time has come to make it habitable and saleable. Easy, right? But Midness Cottage has other ideas. For one thing it’s rather more ‘fixer upper’ than Country Living. And Brid definitely hadn’t planned for the strongly held local belief that the cottage is meant to be the home of the Orkney Witch.

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.

In the bestselling tradition of Fannie Flagg and Jenny Colgan comes Felicity Hayes-McCoy’s U.S. debut about a local librarian who must find a way to rebuild her community and her own life in this touching, enchanting novel set on Ireland’s stunning West Coast.

On a June afternoon in a small city, a wild-eyed girl named Francie dashes down a neighborhood street, clutching a gun. She doesn’t know exactly what she’s running from, and she doesn’t know what she’s heading towards. All she understands is the need to survive. To save herself, she has no choice but to run—and to save those she loves, she must hold tight to that gun. Swirling around Francie is a chorus of friends, family, and neighbors, each person with a different view of her.

You’re just one Jump away from greater fulfillment in your career, your life, and your future. Discover the simple, successful formula for facing fear head on, ditching the excuses that hold you back, and finding the courage to Jump into the next chapter of your life. It’s time to learn the approach that made serial entrepreneur Kim Perell a multimillionaire - and it could make you one too.

An award-winning business writer dismantles the myths of entrepreneurship, replacing them with an essential story about the experience of real business owners in the modern economy.

Carrie Bohlig and Craig Clickner started side hustles to make their lives better - to break free from the limitations of corporate America and have more time with their kids and each other. Today, they're entrepreneurs who have built multiple thriving businesses and helped thousands of people through mentoring, coaching, and sharing their insights across the globe.