Showing results by narrator "Laural Merlington" in All Categories

Reba Farrall was lost - until a kindly old gentleman took her under his wing and helped heal her shattered spirit. Now her dearest friend is gone, leaving her with a doubting, broken heart...and half-interest in a California gem mine. But Chance Walker has burst into Reba's life - a daring adventurer who believes in nothing except the priceless uncut stones for which he searches the earth.

Anzel, a widow in her 60s, lives quietly on her small farm with her grandfather, a Carrier elder from Northern BC. Grandpre and Anzel pass the time playing fierce cribbage games, cutting firewood and tending the vegetable garden. As the days pass Grandpre tells his life story, sharing heart-breaking memories: the death of his family in a devastating epidemic, his son's murder at the hands of a horse thief, and his battle and eventual triumph over alcohol.

Joy Anderson was innocent, young, and trusting when she met Gabe Venture. An aspiring journalist with worlds to conquer, Gabe came to New Mexico to explore the natural wonders of Lost River Cave, with Joy acting as his guide. Surrounded by staggering beauty they both surrendered to a passion too powerful to deny - and Joy gave herself freely to the most extraordinary man she had ever known.

She is a fragile innocent haunted by memories of her past and by dreams of the man who once shared her secrets...the only man she can ever truly love. Now, in the icy chill of a desert storm, they must find the way back to love together - to rekindle the fire whose healing warmth has drawn them home.

How often have you seen a teenage girl pretend to be perturbed, but secretly smile, when she is told that she acts or looks just like her mother? Fathers, brothers, and friends shake their head in wonder as girls “turn into their mothers.” This audiobook contains the 101 best stories from Chicken Soup’s library on the mother-daughter bond. Mothers and daughters will laugh, cry, and find inspiration in these stories that remind them of their mutual appreciation.

Olive is the most unlikely of secret agents, a professional assassin in her sixties who's known only as "The Knit Lady." She begins her trade by killing the Italian mobster who'd cheated her late husband, and then is quietly recruited by "The Brokers." Now she's hired to kidnap and kill retired British agent Benjamin Scarlatt. But The Knit Lady has scruples, and when an Islamic terrorist group takes control of the cruise ship on which both she and Scarlatt are traveling, she decides to fight back, with knitting needle, scalpel - and plastic explosives.

Since the first Christmas, angels have been delivering messages of God's extravagant love. They watched over the Christ Child so long ago, and they are watching over us all today. We Hear the Christmas Angels presents inspiring, personal stories of angels still delivering tidings of comfort, protection and joy, particularly at Christmas time.

These treasured stories from the most influential authors of the 19th and early 20th centuries are selected for their literary importance as well as their dramatic, oral qualities. Listen to these 10 unabridged classics by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, O. Henry, and Willa Cather.

In the high desert town of Frenchman’s Bluff, Idaho, Felicia Kristoffersen has set out to create a future for herself that is better than her painful past. Alone in the world with only her faith to sustain her, she must prove herself as this tiny community’s new school teacher. She cannot...

Aging and recent widow Harriet Beamer insists she’s getting along fine with her dog Humphrey in Philadelphia … until she falls for the fourth time, injuring her ankle, and causing her son and daughter-in-law to cry foul. Insisting Harriet move in with them in California, they make a bet that...

This book continues Chicken Soup for the Soul's focus on inspiration and hope in these difficult times. These inspirational stories remind us that each day holds something to be thankful for - whether it is having the sun shine or having food on the table. Power outages and storms, health scares and illnesses, job woes and financial insecurities, housing challenges and family worries test us all. But there is always a silver lining.

In The Assassin’s Accomplice, historian Kate Clifford Larson tells the gripping story of Mary Surratt, a little-known conspirator in the plot to kill Abraham Lincoln, and the first woman ever to be executed by the federal government. A Confederate sympathizer, Surratt ran the boarding house where the conspirators met to plan Lincoln’s assassination. Set against the backdrop of the Civil War, The Assassin’s Accomplice tells the intricate story of the Lincoln conspiracy through the eyes of its only female participant, offering a fresh perspective on America’s most famous murder.

A rising star in the CIA, Erin Baker is driven by tragedy from her past. When she was a child, her eight-year-old sister, Claire, was kidnapped. Though Claire was miraculously found, she was changed forever. As was Erin, who now just might get what she's always wanted: the chance to make a difference in someone's life. But she must be willing to risk everything she holds dear.

In A Nuclear Family Vacation, husband-and-wife journalists Nathan Hodge and Sharon Weinberger hit the road to explore the secretive world of nuclear weaponry. Weaving together first-class travel writing and crack investigative journalism, the pair pursues both adventures and answers: Why are nuclear weapons still on hair-trigger alert? Is there really such a thing as a suitcase nuke? And which nuclear power plants are most likely to be covers for weapons programs?

Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë's only novel, was first published in 1847 under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, and a posthumous second edition was edited by her sister Charlotte. The name of the novel comes from the Yorkshire manor on the moors on which the story centers. The story tells the tale of the all-encompassing and passionate, yet thwarted, love between Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw, and how this unresolved passion eventually destroys them and many around them.

Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment is a deeply researched - and deeply disturbing - history of guns and gun laws in the United States, from the original colonization of the country to the present. As historian and educator Dunbar-Ortiz explains, in order to understand the current obstacles to gun control, we must understand the history of US guns, from their role in the "settling of America" and the early formation of the new nation, and continuing up to the present.

College friends of Megan's beau, the handsome veterinarian Dr. Denver Finn, are in Winsome for a corporate volunteer event. They will be mentoring troubled kids from a nearby school during a hiking and camping trip. When one of Dr. Finn's friends is murdered at the state park, a student - a boy with a brutal history - becomes the prime suspect. With a teen's life at stake, Megan digs into the victim's past to clear the boy's name.

While Lilly digs into a town beautification project, her friend Tamara O’Connor has greater concerns than well-pruned geraniums. The real-estate-firm owner hasn’t been shy about blaming perennial grouch Gladys Preston for thwarting her many attempts to sell off a beautiful beachside property. But accusations fly when Gladys is suddenly found dead - and Tamara is caught standing over the body with a bloody weapon in her hand. As Tamara becomes the prime murder suspect, Lilly and the Garden Squad ladies set out to prove that someone planted the evidence.

An English emigre who became America's first professional architect, Benjamin Henry Latrobe put his stamp on the built landscape of the new republic. Latrobe contributed to such iconic structures as the south wing of the US Capitol building, the White House, and the Navy Yard. He created some of the early republic's greatest neoclassical interiors, including the Statuary Hall.

Judy L. Mandel was born into a family crippled by grief. But it would be years before she would discover the shocking circumstances of their loss. In her award-winning memoir, Replacement Child - now a New York Times best seller - Mandel tells the true story of a horrifying accident: A plane crashes into a family's home, leaving one daughter severely burned and another dead. The death of the child leaves a hole in the family that threatens to tear it apart. In an attempt to fill the painful gap, the parents have a "replacement child."