Showing results by publisher "HarperAudio" in Small Town & Rural

City girl Melody Harrison finds herself questioning everything in the wake of her mother's deathbed confession of a long-held secret—a secret that drives her far into the outback, to the wide-open skies of Rosalee Station. Matt and Sarah Walsh have finally reached a time in their lives where they are at peace, but their happiness is again thrown into turmoil when Matt answers the door to a young woman with shocking news. But what is the truth? Only by offering her sanctuary at Rosalee Station will they find space to come to grips with each other.

Gemma Hayden has returned to her hometown of Alice Springs for a new job as a primary school teacher. It's been six years since her family broke apart following the disappearance of her twin brother. And the scars still run deep. Hard on the heels of her homecoming, Saul Pearce, the man she once loved, is reposted from Parks and Wildlife in Darwin back to Alice. When an old car wreck is uncovered, washed down the river to Ruby Gap, Saul investigates only to find that the wreck belonged to Ethan, Gemma's twin - and there's a coded note for her in the glovebox.

In the small town of Little Heart, Juliette Kerr and Joel Hunter are drawn together by their shared experience being targeted by school bullies. But when the bullying takes a drastic turn, Juliette can see no other way to protect Joel from the aftermath than to break his heart and make him leave her behind. Devastated and confused, Joel packs his bags, heading far away in the heart of the outback to jackaroo at Rosalee Station for as long as it takes his heart to heal. A decade later, Joel returns to mend fences with his family....

After making a mistake that felt like the end of the world to her teenage self, Nina Jones fled the small town of Huntingvale. Now 16 years later, her beloved adoptive mother, Bea, has passed away, forcing Nina to return and decide whether to sell her family home, Riverstone Ridge. But even though Bea can't be there to help her through it all, she's left Nina five letters, one sent a week, to finally share the secrets she'd been unable to reveal in life.

Marine corporal Rick Sudder is home early from Iraq—his tour ended abruptly on the battlefield. The carefree boy is gone, replaced by a man who believes his future is as bleak as his mirror image. But can the passion and commitment of a young woman who has never given up on him mend his broken body and shattered heart? As the people of Virgin River rally around Rick, another recent arrival tests the mountain town's famous welcoming spirit. Dan Brady has a questionable past, and he's looking for a place to start over. He'd like it to be Virgin River...if he can find a way in.

1898, Geelong, Victoria. Stella Truehart is all alone in the world. Her good-for-nothing husband has died violently at the hands of an unknown assailant. Her mother is dead, her father deserted them before she was born, and now her kindly Truehart grandparents are also in their graves. Private detective Bendigo Barrett has been tasked with finding Stella. He believes his client's intentions are good, but it is evident that someone with darker motives is also seeking her.

It's Sarah Clarke's dream to experience the real Australian outback. When the opportunity comes up to join her boyfriend, Brad, on remote property Rosalee Station, she jumps at the chance. But within days of arriving, her relationship is in tatters and the reality of outback life is fast losing its appeal. Determined to prove herself, Sarah stays on, earning the admiration of Matt, the station owners' son. Beneath the wide outback skies, the pair are irresistibly drawn to each other, until a stolen kiss leads to disaster.

Miss Prudence North is freshly returned from university in Scotland and determined to find her place among the male-dominated world of the new forensic sciences when a high-ranking policeman waylays her. He threatens to charge her father for illegal medical practices unless she helps him build a case against local landowner Jasper Darke by spying on him.

A body has been found in the burned-out wreckage of the church at Gibber's Creek—with older skeletons lying beneath it. The corpse is identified as that of Ignatius Mervyn, the man who attempted to kill Jed Kelly and her unborn child. Newcomer Fish Johnstone is drawn into the investigation, convinced that the police are on the wrong track. But as she digs beneath the warm and welcoming surface of the Gibber's Creek community, more secrets emerge. And Fish must also face her own mystery—the sudden appearance and then disappearance of her father, a Vietnamese refugee she never knew.

1895, Renmark, South Australia: Maggie O'Rourke has always had a hard head. No man was going to tie her down to a life of babies and domestic slavery, even if that man was as good (and as annoyingly attractive) as Sam Taylor. Maggie is happily earning her own way as a maid in a house on the Murray River when disaster strikes. Forced to defend herself and a friend from assault by an evil man, she flees downriver on a paddle steamer. With death at her heels, Maggie begins to realize that a man like Sam might be just who she wants in her hour of need.

When Addison “Roe” Monroe tells me she’s going on a husband hunt at the local lumberjack competition so she can inherit her father’s lumberyard, desperate times call for desperate measures. She’s sworn off romance. Says she’s been through enough tragedy. So I offer myself as an alternative, 'cause that’s what best friends are for. But my stubborn friend, who would rather drive a forklift than get her nails done, refuses to accept my help, and now I find myself training to become a lumberjack.

With snow falling over the redwood forests, secluded Virgin River is the ideal place to spend the holidays. Each year, the close-knit community gathers in the town square to decorate and light a massive tree. Carols are sung, hot chocolate is shared — and a surprise left under the Christmas tree is about to bring two special people together!

Natalie Kaleta will do anything for the artists at her gallery, including risk life, limb, and the effect of humidity on her naturally curly hair. Braving a downpour to check on reclusive Ronan Mitchell, Natalie gets stranded by a mudslide at his mountain home, where the brooding glass artist reveals his playful side, sending her inconvenient crush from under-the-radar to over-the-top. After a secret tore apart his family and made him question his sense of self, Ronan fled his hometown for Happily Inc, but the sunny small town can’t fix his damaged heart.

It's been fifteen years since Lucy Sinclair saw her father. Fifteen long years since she sat in a courtroom and watched him sentenced to life in prison. He murdered three victims—all people she knew—which ruined her life at just seventeen. But now she's back in Virginia to talk to him, wondering if there's more to the story of what happened that fateful night.

Molly McDaniel’s life is falling apart. Between her day job as a barista, her night job at a call center, and her crushing student loans, she’s barely getting by. And that dream she has of starting a wedding event planning business? The dream that led to all those student loan in the first place? She can feel it slipping farther and farther out of reach every day. So the absolute last thing she needs is to discover she’s inherited a run-down, struggling horse barn out of the blue, courtesy of her estranged late aunt.

For many years Elizabeth Lawson has battled single-handedly to run the family's historic horse stud in memory of her beloved father. But a devastating loss puts her dreams at risk. With no options left, Liz is forced to turn to her estranged sister Kayla for help. Kayla has built a new life in the city as a wedding planner, far removed from the stableyard sweat and dust of her rural upbringing. She never thought she'd go back. But when Liz calls out of the blue, Kayla forms a plan that could save their childhood home.

The Pilbara, late 1800s: Frontier country, the wild west of Australia—a lawless, violent place where treachery is a way of life. Widower Charles Burton arrives in this forbidding corner of the world with his three young children. They've travelled half the globe, from the lush rolling hills of the Yorkshire Dales, on a mission to save their family's sheep and cattle property, which has been forced into debt by the avarice of a ruthless Londoner.

Shelby McIntyre has big plans — plans that include finding Mr Right. Her dream man will have a clean-shaven jaw, creases in his pants and hopefully an advanced degree. What she gets is rugged Luke Riordan. At 25, after five years as her mother’s caregiver, it’s time for Shelby to experience freedom and adventure. Time for travel, college, and romance. But when she visits Virgin River, she runs into Luke Riordan, decidedly not whom she has in mind.

The news of her husband's infidelity comes as a nasty shock to Jenny Reynolds, part-time building control officer and full-time mother—even though, to her surprise and embarrassment, her first reaction is relief, not anguish. What really hurts is her children's unhappiness at the break-up, and the growing realisation that, alone, she may lose the family farm.

Jemima Kincaid loves her home, her horses, and her job as a farrier. Life has not been kind to her, but Jemima is happy in the close-knit rural community of Horseshoe Hill, which rallied around in her hour of need. Even so, she is fiercely independent and will never rely on anyone again. Particularly a man like Finn Blackwood. An infuriatingly attractive geneticist and wild animal vet, Finn threatens not only the serenity of Jemima's present, but that of the future she has so carefully mapped out.