Showing results by publisher "HarperAudio" in Coming of Age

A girl and her mother have been on the run for sixteen years, from police and the monster they left in their kitchen with a knife in his throat. They've found themselves a home inside a van with four flat tyres parked in a scrapyard by the edge of the Brisbane River.

When Caitlin inherits a significant sum of money on her fortieth birthday, she decides to break the habits of a lifetime and throw caution to the winds. She's about to tell her husband Paul that they're leaving London on a once-in-a-lifetime journey to Eat Pray Love their way around the world, only ... she doesn't tell Paul that, because before the candles are lit, he tells her that he's very much in love with someone else. After a drunken night trying to console herself, Caitlin books tickets to Australia - anything to get as far away as possible.

A young girl loses both her parents in a tragic event and is taken to live with her grandmother on a flower farm. Growing up, Alice learns the language of Australian native flowers as a way to say the things that are too hard to speak. But she also learns that there are secrets within secrets about her past. An unexpected betrayal leaves her reeling, and she escapes to try to make her own—sometimes painful—way through the world and to find her story.

Poppy's world has tipped sideways: the husband who never wanted children has betrayed her with her broody best friend. At least Annalise is on her side. Poppy's new friend is determined to celebrate their freedom from kids, so together they create a Facebook group to meet up with like-minded women and perhaps vent a little about smug mums and their privileges at work.

Darwin, 1942, and as Japanese bombs rain down, motherless Molly Hook, the gravedigger's daughter, turns once again to the sky for guidance. She carries a stone heart inside a duffel bag next to the map that leads to Longcoat Bob, the deep-country sorcerer who put a curse on her family. By her side are the most unlikely travelling companions: Greta, a razor-tongued.

Brisbane, 1983: A lost father, a mute brother, a mum in jail, a heroin dealer for a stepfather and a notorious crim for a babysitter. It's not as if Eli's life isn't complicated enough already. He's just trying to follow his heart, learning what it takes to be a good man, but life just keeps throwing obstacles in the way - not least of which is Tytus Broz, legendary Brisbane drug dealer. But Eli's life is about to get a whole lot more serious. He's about to fall in love. And, oh yeah, he has to break into Boggo Road Gaol on Christmas Day, to save his mum.

Sorrow and Bliss meets Normal People in this utterly compelling, darkly humorous millennial coming-of-age novel about a 27-year-old single Jewish woman in Melbourne who must learn to reconcile family expectations, cultural constraints and inter-generational trauma with her own desires. A coruscating new voice.

Escaping from an abusive marriage, 17-year-old Lakshmi makes her way alone to the vibrant 1950s pink city of Jaipur. There she becomes the most highly requested henna artist - and confidante - to the wealthy women of the upper class. But trusted with the secrets of the wealthy, she can never reveal her own....

Yunjae was born with a brain condition called alexithymia that makes it hard for him to feel emotions like fear or anger. He does not have friends - the two almond-shaped neurons located deep in his brain have seen to that - but his devoted mother and grandmother aren’t fazed by his condition. Their little home above his mother’s used bookstore is decorated with colorful Post-it notes that remind him when to smile, when to say "thank you", and when to laugh. Yunjae grows up content, even happy, with his small family in this quiet, peaceful space.

India, 1986: Mukta, a 10-year-old village girl from the lower-caste Yellama cult, has come of age and must fulfill her destiny of becoming a temple prostitute, as her mother and grandmother did before her. In an attempt to escape her fate, Mukta is sent to be a house girl for an upper-middle class family in Mumbai. There she discovers a friend in the daughter of the family, high-spirited eight-year-old Tara, who helps her recover from the wounds of her past.

This novel is about a woman called Martha. She knows there is something wrong with her, but she doesn't know what it is. Her husband Patrick thinks she is fine. He says everyone has something, the thing is just to keep going. Martha told Patrick before they got married that she didn't want to have children. He said he didn't mind either way because he has loved her since he was fourteen and making her happy is all that matters, although he does not seem able to do it. By the time Martha finds out what is wrong, it doesn't really matter anymore.

Connie Mulligan, daughter of a fourth-generation Tasmanian dairy farmer, feels like she doesn't belong–anywhere. She's got big dreams and big ideas, but she made a mess of her university degree and has been sent home in disgrace. The man who was responsible for her failure won't get out of her nightmares, her father won't listen to any of her ideas on how to make environmentally positive changes to the way the dairy farm is being run, her mum thinks she should go on anti-depressants, and she keeps having what her psychologist calls 'episodes'.

A brutal murder in a town called Treachery? It's a story most journos would kill for, but for Stuart Dryden, it's a major inconvenience. He didn't take the gig at the local rag for its bustling crime beat. He'd sacrifice a career-making story for happy hour at the pub, but not even he can let a grisly murder through to the keeper. Especially when he keeps getting scooped by a persistent kid with a disposable Kodak.

In 1970s Baltimore, 14-year-old Mary Jane loves cooking with her mother, singing in her church choir, and enjoying her family’s subscription to the Broadway Showtunes of the Month record club. Shy, quiet, and bookish, she’s glad when she lands a summer job as a nanny for the daughter of a local doctor. A respectable job, Mary Jane’s mother says. In a respectable house.

Joni, Deb, Eden, and Trina try to catch up once a year for a girls' getaway. Careers, husbands, and babies have pulled these old high-school friends in different directions, and the closeness they once enjoyed is increasingly elusive. This year, in a bid to revive their intimacy, they each share a secret in an anonymous letter. But the revelations are unnerving. Then a fifth letter is discovered, venting long-held grudges and murderous thoughts. But who was the author? And which of the friends should be worried?

Love for nine-year-old twins Jon and Eden Hardacre is simple. Their mum, the creek that they swim in, each other—this is the love that they trust, love as clear and pure as sunlight, as honey, as water. But then there's a terrible accident. And in its wake, they develop a desperation—a yearning—to outgrow tragedy. They get older, compete with each other, fall in love with the same girl, and begin to realise that their lives—and who they love—demand something more. Something deeper. Richer.

From award-winning author Sarah Beth Durst, a stand-alone epic fantasy set in a brand-new world of towering mountains and sparkling cities, in which a band of aging warriors have a second chance to defeat dark magic and avenge a haunting loss.

Life, death, and rebirth - in Becar, who you are in this life will determine your next life. Yet there is hope - you can change your destiny with the choices you make. But for the darkest individuals, there is no redemption: you come back as a kehok, a monster, and are doomed to be a kehok for the rest of time. Unless you can win the Races. After a celebrated career as an elite kehok rider, Tamra became a professional trainer. Then a tragic accident shattered her confidence, damaged her reputation, and left her nearly broke.

Cassie Quinn may only be twenty-three, but she knows a few things. One: money can’t buy happiness, but it’s certainly better to have it. Two: family matters most. Three: her younger brother Billy is not a rapist. When Billy, a junior at Princeton, is arrested for assaulting his ex-girlfriend, Cassie races home to Manhattan to join forces with her big brother Nate and their parents, Lawrence and Eleanor. The Quinns scramble to hire the best legal minds money can buy, but Billy fits the all-too-familiar sex-offender profile—white, athletic, and privileged—that makes headlines and sways juries.

Evie and Thomas experience a very different war. Frustrated by life as a privileged young lady, Evie longs to play a greater part in the conflict - but how? - and as Thomas struggles with the unimaginable realities of war, he also faces personal battles back home, where War Office regulations on press reporting cause trouble at his father's newspaper business. Through their letters Evie and Thomas share their greatest hopes and fears - and grow ever fonder from afar. Can love flourish amid the horror of the First World War, or will fate intervene?