Showing results by narrator "Amy Soakes" in All Categories

The Dove’s Nest and Other Stories is a collection of both finished and unfinished short stories written by Katherine Mansfield. The collection was published posthumously, not long after Mansfield’s death in 1923, by her husband, John Middleton Murry.

The Garden Party and Other Stories was published in 1922. A collection of fifteen short stories, it explores themes including life and death, gender and family roles, relationships and duty.

Maggie Walker has never called Wirra Station home. Orphaned as a child, she spent more time at boarding school and then working in the city than she ever spent on the edge of the outback. But when her great aunt dies, Maggie inherits everything and reluctantly returns to tidy the place up before selling. Ambitious cowboy-next-door Max O’Connor has the means and the desire to buy Wirra Station outright and return it to its former glory. But first, he wants elusive Maggie Walker to know what she’s giving up.

I should have known better. Hot guys didn’t hit on big girls without an agenda. They didn’t approach them in bars and talk their way into your bed. They also didn’t make you feel beautiful and proud of your curves. But I was going through a dry spell - actually, I’d kind of been going through a dry spell all my life - and dry spells sucked. Of course I slept with him. Fell for his easy smile; the man swept me off my feet, rocked my world, then robbed me blind. Angry and embarrassed, I engaged the help of my best friend to track the thief down and make him return what he took. But what does a girl do when she finds not one thief, but an entire family?

Bailey Sheppard had loved Nick Heart for as long as she could remember. They had been best friends in school and graduated to a friends-with-benefits arrangement after she left for university. His once-a-month visits, when she would have him all to herself for the weekend, were the highlight of her life. And then he told her he was getting married. Bailey needed Nick in her life. She wanted to be the one he married and lived happily ever after with. So she hatched a plan to stop the wedding and steal the groom. And then she met Hunter.

When a mysterious sickness spreads throughout the land and monsters terrorize Alveria, tamer trainee Mari Asadottier and Prince Kai Afkarr-Younger might be the only ones who can stop it. But after three unsuccessful terms at Alveria’s Dragon Akademy, 17-year-old Mari only has one last chance to bond with a dragon. And after two years stuck in his dragon form, Prince Kai’s draconian instincts are growing as powerful and uncontrollable as his magic, leaving him unable to claim his ill father’s throne when Alveria needs him most.

Amongst the remnants of the ancient Saidican Empire lies Golias Hollow, an underground community of people who’ve taken refuge from the tainted surface. Completely cutoff from the outside world, the men and women of the Hollow follow the teachings of the prophet Dormiar, sacrificing a select few to the outside each year in a ceremony known as “The Choosing”.

In the summer of 1839, 26-year-old Louisa Anne Meredith, in the company of her husband, Charles Meredith, sailed from England to the British colony of New South Wales, in what was then New Holland. Four years later, she published a detailed account of the years since she had left England. A fascinating window into the past, Louisa's impressions and experiences cover the four-month ocean voyage; life within the fledgling city of Sydney; travels across the Blue Mountains to Bathurst; and eventual settlement at Homebush in Sydney's west.

In the hours just before dawn, blasphemous curses echo throughout the stone manor. A knife clatters to the floor, and a feisty young widow is bound, blindfolded, and led to the marriage altar. The king couldn't possibly have sanctioned this farce of a marriage, could he? After all, she alone transformed a few mud huts and starving serfs into a flourishing town, never once hesitating to pay generous taxes to his royal kingdom.

This collection was published in 1901 and contains some of Lawson's best known stories. Most of the stories are set in the Australian bush, and feature many of Lawson's iconic characters, like squatters, swagmen, and struggling selector farmers. A persistent theme is the harshness of rural life and the inevitability of personal tragedy.

She can save her people - or doom the world. Narissea faces an impossible choice. Armed with a map discovered in the hidden shrine, she’s forced to lead Inyene’s heir through the wilds of the Plains to claim the ultimate prize. For only the wearer of the Stone Crown can command all dragons and take the High Throne that rules over the three kingdoms. To place the crown’s power into Inyene’s hands is unthinkable. Yet failure to obtain it means certain death.

Shy librarian Catena likes her quiet life, until a huge naked man muscles his way into her house, insisting he's been woken from his centuries-long sleep to be her personal protector.

Gertrude Stein's work flourished in a world which was finding bold new ways of expressing itself. Forms like Impressionism, cubism, expressionsism and other non-representational styles were developed that provoked and challenged the observer (as well as the established art world). What avant-garde artists did with paint and ink, Gertrude Stein did with words – dispensing with conventions of grammar and clarity, she gave free rein to word play and the musicality of sounds, without regard to their meaning or relationships.

Gertrude Stein held a unique position at the center of the modernist movement. She was a novelist, poet, playwright, and art collector. Born in America, she moved with her family to Paris where she ran a Paris salon frequented by many famous historical figures, such as Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henri Matisse, Ezra Pound, Sherwood Anderson, and Sinclair Lewis.

Since her mother died, Rochelle has known nothing but bad luck. Barely scraping through her studies in-between working two jobs while living with her soon-to-be ex-boyfriend—if he’d only listen to her long enough to hear her say it’s over—it’s all she can do to keep it together.

This collection contains a mixture of stories about ghosts and contacts from spirits, some by celebrated authors, together with essays on psychical research. As Joseph French notes in the preface, even for the skeptic, tales of ghostly activity retain a distinct fascination. The widespread interest in psychic phenomena in the early twentieth century proved to be a significant stimulus to literary production.

New problems bring new opportunities. After escaping the attack on Varna, Rav, Ari, and friends begin converting an ancient arena into a home defensible against the Weatherblight. For the first time in his life, Ari understands what it means to be a part of a real community. But establishing a new frontier town brings with it a new set of responsibilities. He’s needed as a leader, a cornerstone of the newly growing settlement. He’s needed as a man, to give comfort and intimacy to the women he loves. He’s needed as Lord Stoneblood.

More than a month after Ari’s dramatic departure from Cliffhaven, he still remains adrift. During the long journey south back to Ethereal Tower, he thinks of nothing so much as what he could have done differently to save Kerys and Eva, the two women he loved most. The loss of them affects him like an unhealed wound, painful and prone to tearing open at the slightest touch. He’s left with empty questions, a dormant sword, and a fast dwindling lifespan. Oh, and Rin. Of course, Ari has never been the type to give up easily.

After a harrowing escape from the Weatherblight, Ari, Kerys, and Eva find themselves on Deepwater Spire, an ancient structure surrounded by endless ocean. With no other options, they bide their time, slowly building up the essence they need to reactivate the teleportation wards that will allow them to travel freely. Their isolation takes on a life of its own, manifesting as much in their relationships with each other as their situation in the world.

Big, sexy men who don’t relate well to kids need not apply.... Ben Harland is, by his own admission, a bit of a grouch. He doesn’t do soppy chick flicks or cozy home and family. He sure doesn’t need any more drama in his world. But life has a way of biting him in the ass. Cue insta-daddyhood to an eight-year-old girl who lands on his doorstep and an out-of-control attraction to Stewart Island's hot school teacher. Kezia Murphy plays her widow card well. When you don’t trust people not to let you down, you don’t get involved.