Showing results by narrator "Ashley A." in All Categories

From teenage memories of staying with a cross-dressing cousin in Sydney, to estranged siblings scattering the ashes of a family member, not to mention perplexing encounters in Jordan, these eight stories reflect on family, friendship, desire, and belonging in a queer world. Ashley Sievwright is the author of the novels The Shallow End (Shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers Prize Best First Novel) and Walter.

Today we have ghosts that haunted our ancestors, as well as our own modern revenants, and there appears to be no earthly use trying to banish or exorcise them by such a simple strategy as refusing to believe in them. Since man knows that whether or not he has seen a ghost, presently he will become one, and thus he has become fascinated with the subject. Therefore he creates ghosts, not merely in his own image, but according to his dreams of power.

Rachael spends her camping trip in a state of constant arousal, being gagged, forced to wear a leash, spanked in public, and roughly used for pleasure. The four men she's with don't hesitate to take advantage of Rachael, embarrassing her and using her as they see fit.

After everything she's been through over the past ten years, Jess should be focusing on her healing. She should be figuring out where her future will take her. And she should be finding herself after her abusive husband ripped away her identity. Too bad someone else has different plans.

A star-crossed union of My Neighbor Totoro, The Iron Giant, and Interstellar, this environmental sci-fi fairy tale is about a young girl who saves a mysterious time traveler—and maybe the world in the process.

Drawing on encounters between the Creeks of the Southeast and the Mi’kmaq of Nova Scotia in the eighteenth century, Savage Systers reveals a world in which Native women wielded power through means that shocked European observers: ritualized torture, scalp dances, brutal initiation rites, even infanticide and cannibalism. Far from aberrations, these acts embodied forms of feminine authority rooted deep in tribal culture. In deciding whether a captive lived or died, whether a stranger was rejected or absorbed, Native women determined the fate of peoples and nations.

Why do some people flourish under relentless pressure while others fall apart? Burnout Divide reveals the hidden factors that separate resilience from collapse—and how you can harness them to thrive in an unforgiving world. Drawing on cutting-edge neuroscience, psychology, and real-world case studies, this book takes you beyond the surface symptoms of stress to expose the biological, mental, and social forces that determine your breaking point.

Mae and Ari are not your average power couple. Their love story started when they met at Leeds University. Back when Mae, whilst never short of a date and confident about who she is at her core, needed Ari's bright light to help her grow into herself. Ari, having run from New York following an undisclosed scandal and battling his own demons, held onto Mae as his grounding anchor. Though they quickly become inseparable, their inimitable bond must survive guilt, secrets, growing up and, ultimately, love in all its complex and fluid forms.

Embark on an inspirational journey with this classic best seller about the life of Francesca Cabrini. Angel Studios is proud to bring you a special edition of this biography and the new motion picture, Cabrini to tell her story and inspire all people to love with unstoppable determination, as she did. This gripping biography unveils the extraordinary adventures of Mother Cabrini, a visionary Italian American religious sister who defied the odds, founded the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and became the first American saint.

United States of True Crime is an anthology series with books devoted to the most disturbing cases in each of the 50 states. This book focuses on twenty of the most chilling crimes in Florida history.

Twenty years ago, Mari vanished while backpacking through Thailand with her boyfriend, Luke. He was accused of murder, but has always insisted he's innocent. Besides, her body was never found. Now, he's finally ready to talk. And filmmaker Cassidy Chambers wants to be the one to uncover what really happened, back then, in the dark of the jungle. But as she delves deeper into the past, Cassidy begins to fear what lies ahead, and the secrets buried along the way.

'This is a book that everyone must read. It's funny, moving and of course it's often sad. But mainly it's a beautiful and fascinating and enlightening portrait of the care system, a world that is barely understood by many of us. It is also a proper page turner: the twists and turns and set-backs...

Born in East Africa, Yusuf has few qualms about the journey he is to make. It never occurs to him to ask why he is accompanying Uncle Aziz or why the trip has been organised so suddenly, and he does not think to ask when he will be returning. But the truth is that his ‘uncle' is a rich and powerful merchant and Yusuf has been pawned to him to pay his father's debts. Paradise is a rich tapestry of myth, dreams and Biblical and Koranic tradition, the story of a young boy's coming of age against the backdrop of an Africa increasingly corrupted by colonialism and violence.

In Tides of Grief, Waves of Grace, Ashley Jo shares her raw and unfiltered memoir of surviving loss, addiction, heartbreak, and scandal and discovering the power of grace. From the outside, Ashley seemed like the picture of resilience: a Christian wife, mother, and executive leading a thriving team. But behind the polished surface, she was reeling from unimaginable pain—the death of her son, the collapse of her marriage, and the unraveling of her identity. When her life spun into a scandal no one expected, she spiraled from living with an alcoholic to becoming one herself.

School can feel like a battlefield. The popular group. The endless selfies. The pressure to be perfect when you feel far from it. Nora, Rochelle, Leah, Amara, and Vera know exactly what that’s like. One wants to fit in at any cost. Another hides her grief behind a smile. One worries her accent makes her “too different.” And some are just tired of never feeling “enough.”

The first song is a jazz number that Jane thinks would fit perfectly with the inside of the cute bookshop. The second is a punk song that William, the mysterious traveling musician, sings to her because it uses her name. The third song on the soundtrack? Well, that's a love song. The bookshop is the start, but chaos in the form of her ex-husband forces her out of town to find the traveling musician and become reacquainted with the music she once made. But her ex continues to threaten the two things that she's rediscovered: love and music. And for every love story, there is the perfect song.

Mikayla Hartman thought distance would be enough. After fleeing Miami with her thirteen-year-old daughter, Blair, she rebuilds their lives in the quiet foothills outside Boulder, Colorado. Mountains rise behind their new home like silent guardians. Blair makes friends. The house fills with furniture, laughter, and the fragile hope of a second chance. But the past does not stay buried. Lester, Mikayla’s abusive husband, refuses to let go. His messages grow darker. His tone shifts from desperate to cold. Then a photo arrives on Mikayla’s phone.

"This plot isn't just twisted—it's down-right gnarled." —People Magazine It takes a special family to turn a home into a nightmare. Since her husband’s unsolved murder three years ago, Iris Blodgett’s life has unraveled. Awash in grief and buried in debt, she can’t pay her...

What if someone had the power to bring characters from a book to life…should they be allowed to glimpse reality? Imara is that person, a book witch who is convinced of her superiority, especially over book magicians. Even if one of those magicians is her former best friend Elle, owner of The Enchanted Page bookstore. Jaiden is hesitant about love after growing up with her free-spirited mother, but somehow finds herself drawn to two different women. One she can’t decide whether to kiss or smack, and the other who might not be real.

Dear Catherine, he began. Here I sit, making a meal out of asking you to dinner. I don’t really know how to do it. To have cultural integrity, I would have to send my aunt to speak, discreetly, to your aunt, who would then speak to your mother, who would speak to my mother, who would speak to my father, who would speak to me and then approach your mother, who would then approach you. Demoralised by small persecutions and the squalor and poverty of his life, Daud takes refuge in his imagination.