Showing results by narrator "Abby Craden" in All Categories

Jazz...Booze...Boys...It’s a dangerous combination. Every girl wants what she can’t have. Seventeen-year-old Gloria Carmody wants the flapper lifestyle - and the bobbed hair, cigarettes, and music-filled nights that go with it. Now that she’s engaged to Sebastian Grey, scion of one of Chicago’s most powerful families, Gloria’s party days are over before they’ve even begun...or are they? Clara Knowles, Gloria’s goody-two-shoes cousin, has arrived to make sure the high-society wedding comes off without a hitch - but Clara isn’t as lily-white as she appears.

A famous journalism dean is found dead at the bottom of a stairwell. Accident or murder? The police suspect members of the faculty who had engaged in fierce quarrels with the dean - distinguished scholars who were known to attack the dean like brutal schoolyard bullies. When Meredith "Red" Solaris is appointed interim dean, the faculty suspects are furious.

In Alexandra Kleeman's second book, a collection of 12 stories irresistibly seductive in their strangeness, she explores human life from beginning to end: the distress of birth into a world already formed; the brief and confusing period of "living" where we understand what is expected of us and struggle to do it; and the death-y period toward the end where we sense it is ending and will end only partially understood, at best.

Power...love...scandal...there’s never enough to go around. In the city that never sleeps, Lorraine Dyer is wide awake. Ever since she exposed Clara Knowles for the tramp she was - and lost her closest confidante in the process - Lorraine has spent every second scheming to make her selfish, lovesick ex-best friend pay for what she did. No one crosses Lorraine. Not even Gloria. True love conquers everything - or so Gloria Carmody crazily believed. She and Jerome Johnson can barely scrape together cash for their rent, let alone have a moment to whisper sweet nothings in the dark.

Ashley Bowman is having a bad week. Reeling from the death of her beloved grandmother, she returns to the Florida Keys only to learn that a heartless Miami developer has gotten hold of the crappy vacation rentals she calls home. Ashley has one day to clear out before Roman Díaz destroys the only place in the world that matters to her. Chaining herself to a palm tree in the bulldozers’ path seems like a good way to stop him...until she realizes she should’ve brought food and water. And pants. Also, it would help if the evil developer weren’t so ridiculously hot....

It was cold, they were trapped, and Rory Buchanan had made love to a perfect stranger - and enjoyed it way more than she should have. But how was a regular girl from Whitehorse supposed to know the royal protocol for dealing with a fantasy one-night stand? It soon became clear that Devlin Barrow would slay any dragon for local girl Rory. A court full of nobles had even descended on the small Montana community.

Parties, bad boys, speakeasies - life in Manhattan has become a woozy blur for Clara Knowles. If Marcus Eastman truly loved her, how could he have fallen for another girl so quickly? Their romance mustn't have been as magical as Clara thought. Being a Barnard girl is the stuff of Lorraine Dyer's dreams. Finding out that Marcus is marrying a gold digger who may or may not be named Anastasia? A nightmare. And Gloria? Gloria Carmody is spending the last dizzying days of summer on Long Island, yachting on the sound....

Cowboy After Dark: White-water rafting guide Liam Magee is a cowboy at heart - happy to return to his country roots at Thunder Mountain Ranch for his foster brother's wedding. And when Hope Caldwell shows up as a guest - well, the occasion just got more interesting. Make Mine a Marine: Matt Ryan wants to settle down to a peaceful life as a helicopter instructor at the local base. When he meets free-spirited antiques dealer Chelly Richardson and finds out she's homeless, well, he has to help.

As far as inventor Samantha O'Connel is concerned, work is better than food, a social life - even sex. Of course, all it takes is a single phone call from Matt Wilkinson - the ridiculously hot object of her girlhood fantasies - for Sam to discover even she has some naughty needs that won't be ignored. Sam's biggest challenge is that while Matt is just as much a workaholic as she is, he's also a wealthy, sexy bachelor who can have any woman he wants.

Aubrey Hayes @windowUndresser Window dressing at Le Muse lingerie = best job ever. LOVE. But must design The Ultimate Window Display of Hot Sex before Xmas. #panic 24h.

Violent murders occur in Paradise City as counterfeit comarré are systematically hunted. As war erupts at home, Malkolm and Chrysabelle head to New Orleans to recover the Ring of Sorrows. Forced to make a life-and-death decision, Chrysabelle will realize that her relationship to Malkolm may have fatal consequences. Samhain approaches, bringing with it the final melding of the mortal and othernatural worlds. No one knows just how much power the night holds....

Picking the wrong men is a talent Meagan Mitchell has perfected. She's sweet, confident, beautiful - and single. With her 30th birthday sneaking up on her, she needs a new plan. No more Mr. Wrongs or Mr.Bads. It's time to find Mr. Safe.

Nineteen-year-old Whit Conrad leaves her conservative Pennsylvania home for sunny California, looking for independence, a fresh start, and a place to stash her grief. She promptly finds a job at a tattoo parlor, a craptastic first apartment, and one friend - Ryan - who is a little less friend, a little more benefits. Deo Beckett is a soulful surfer with a passion for tattoos and beautiful women. On the eve of his twenty-second birthday, he finds himself living with his grandfather, recently unemployed, and seriously adrift.

Since emigrating from Bangladesh, 14-year-old Nadira and her family have been living in New York City on expired visas, hoping to realize their dream of becoming legal U.S. citizens. But after 9/11, everything changes. Suddenly being Muslim means you are dangerous - a suspected terrorist. When Nadira's father is arrested and detained at the U.S.-Canadian border, Nadira and her older sister, Aisha, are told to carry on as if everything is the same. The teachers at Flushing High don't ask any questions, but Aisha falls apart....

After an op in Istanbul goes sour, all Alexandra Poe wants is a little down time, and a chance to finally sell off the family vacation home in Key Largo which carries too many painful memories. Instead, she finds herself on a private Bahamian island, working with Deuce and Cooper to relieve a human rodent of some very sensitive codes, and to take down one of the world's most notorious terrorists. Just another job for Stonewell International. Or is it?

Brady Marshall has made a career of playing it safe. When he decides to do something rash and becomes a Navy SEAL, he thinks he's finally escaped the rigid structure of the high society life his parents forced down his throat. All he does is trade in one set of rules for another. He follows military protocol to a T, but it still results in the death of an entire team of Navy SEALS and puts his best friends directly in harm's way.

After losing her on-air job two years ago, television host Robin Trainer has fought her way back and now she's hotter than ever. With her new show climbing in the ratings and her first book a best seller, she's being dubbed a media double threat. But suddenly, things begin to go wrong. Small incidents at first: A nasty note left in her purse; her photo shredded. But the obnoxious quickly becomes threatening when the foundation the makeup artist uses burns Robin's face. It wasn't an accident - someone had deliberately doctored the product.

Max Dutton, a starting NFL linebacker for the Los Angeles Condors, is certain he's going to die young, since his father and grandfather both passed away at an early age. Believing his life will be cut short, Max lives every moment to its fullest. For this reason, Max also shies away from forming close relationships. What would be the point of falling in love and starting a family, only to leave them as his father left him and his sisters? Nutrition expert Kari Murphy used to think Max Dutton was to die for. She's older and wiser now.

Tattoo artist Ronnie Clark is counting the days until Valentine's Day is over. Ronnie doesn't do romance. She doesn't do flowers or dates, and she sure as hell doesn't do love - not anymore.... Love leads to heartbreak, and she's vowed never to let herself get hurt again. Sergeant First Class Kale Emerson is home on his mid-tour leave from Iraq, but he only has one thing on his mind - returning to his soldiers to finish leading their mission. He's dedicated to his men and to his country, and he's not interested in getting wrapped up in a distracting relationship - but casual sex, that's a different story.

Come Closer, Cowboy: Mallory Brandt needs a change. The kind of change that makes a gal close her Hollywood bar, move 1,400 miles across the country, and start a new life in Blackfoot Falls, Montana - in four weeks. Daring Her SEAL: Devil-may-care Navy SEAL Levi Brandon faces a terrifying task: telling Ashley Dixon that their faux wedding during their last mission together was actually real.