Showing results by narrator "Esther Wane" in All Categories

Many of us share a shameful little secret: deep down we feel like complete frauds and are convinced that our accomplishments are the result of luck rather than skill. This is a psychological phenomenon known as Imposter Syndrome. This book examines the reasons why up to 70 percent of us are developing this syndrome - and what we can do about it.

In this Very Short Introduction Laura Marcus defines what we mean by "autobiography", and considers its relationship with similar literary forms such as memoirs, journals, letters, diaries, and essays. Analyzing the core themes in autobiographical writing, such as confession, conversion and testimony; romanticism and the journeying self; Marcus discusses the autobiographical consciousness (and the roles played by time, memory and identity), and considers the relationship between psychoanalysis and autobiography.

Brenna Seagrave doesn't want to be a countess. She prefers her life of danger and disguise as a spy for the kingdom of Andar, but the Andari court isn't quite ready for a countess who engages in espionage. Feeling trapped, Brenna accepts an invitation to a mysterious estate, where she hopes to connect with the mother she's never had a chance to know. But nothing is quite as Brenna expects.

Princess Ilani is an outcast, shunned since her seventh birthday for possessing forbidden magic. But when her 12 sisters are trapped by a deception that threatens to tear their father's empire apart, Ilani must come out of hiding and join forces with a devilishly charming foreigner whose motives remain shrouded by secrecy and mistrust.

Once upon a time Gabrielle Price wrote and published an extraordinary novel. But 20 years on her literary star has dimmed, her "work of genius" is all but forgotten, and no further novels have materialised. She now lives an unremarkable life: middle-aged, living alone in the sleepy village she grew up in, and working as a housekeeper for the local vicar. Her lonely existence is dominated by memories of her best friend Madeleine, who died young, in tragic and mysterious circumstances.

Princess Adelaide has been missing for years. And that's exactly the way she wants it. Haunted by her past, not even the curse that entraps her is enough to make her long for her old home. But her past finds her anyway, in the form of a handsome prince from her childhood. Adelaide doesn't want to let Gabe in, but a sinister force is spreading fear throughout her new kingdom, and only Gabe has the will to help her. Adelaide can't refuse his assistance - not when the evil might soon ensnare much more than a solitary princess.

Snow has always lived under the shadow of her cruel stepmother, with only her beloved father and her childhood friend - the huntsman, Alexander - to make life bearable. When her father dies, she should be crowned queen, but instead she finds herself fleeing for her life. With no allies, no skills, and no food, her future could be over before it has truly begun. But there's more at stake than just one life. If Snow can't claim her throne, her kingdom faces destruction. Snow has to make a choice: focus on her own salvation or put everything on the line - even those she loves the most.

Uncover the methods of megastars like Oprah Winfrey, Earvin "Magic" Johnson, and Sir Richard Branson, who make the world a better place through purposeful - and highly successful - business strategies. The stellar authorial team shares in candid detail the setbacks and achievements they experienced building successful enterprises and charities - with purpose.

When Isla, a 65-year-old grandmother, is left nothing but an old painting in her mother’s will, while her sisters and aunt inherit the estate, she is devastated. Close to retirement, getting ready to live on her own terms, the last thing she expects at this time of her life is such turmoil. So, to find an explanation for her mother’s rejection, she embarks on a road-trip.

After Ludwig van Beethoven’s death, a love letter in his writing was discovered, addressed only to his ‘Immortal Beloved’. Decades later, Countess Therese Brunsvik claims to have been the composer’s lost love. Yet is she concealing a tragic secret? Who is the one person who deserves to know the truth? Becoming Beethoven’s pupils in 1799, Therese and her sister, Josephine, followed his struggles against the onset of deafness, Viennese society’s flamboyance, privilege and hypocrisy and the upheavals of the Napoleonic wars.

A young writer is brutally attacked in her home and left for dead. For her sister, Nina Bergmann, it's the beginning of a nightmare that will threaten to destroy her marriage, her job and ultimately her life. As she sets out to unravel the truth about what really happened to her sister, Nina comes face-to-face with inner demons she believed long since banished and discovers that her sister's past and that of the once-divided city are intertwined in unimaginable ways. The Wall may be gone, but its legacy still haunts Berlin.

In the aftermath of an asteroid impact, Earth’s power grid is damaged nearly beyond recovery. The survival of our world may well depend on energy sources collected from an abandoned undersea settlement beneath the icy surface of Enceladus. Earth-raised Colonel Carter Rhodes, in charge of Earth’s recovery efforts, calls upon Gwen Baré, a Venusian engineer, to regain control of the deserted moon outpost and collect fuel for Earth’s collapsing power grids.

The story of Violette Szabo is one of the most extraordinary in the annals of World War II espionage and covert operations. Totally fearless and a dead shot, Violette Szabo volunteered to become part of the Special Operations Executive, Britain's premier sabotage and subversion organization of the time. On June 7, 1944, Violette left behind a two-year-old daughter to parachute into France on a special mission.

Tom is a successful author, but he’s struggling to finish his novel. His main distraction is an online admirer, Evie, who simply won’t leave him alone. Evie is smart, well read, and unstable. She lives with her father, and her social-media friendships are not only her escape - they’re everything she has. When she’s hit with a restraining order, her world is turned upside down, and Tom is free to live his life again, to concentrate on writing. But things aren’t really adding up.

A long lost relative escapes to Clover Springs, but it's not the happy reunion anticipated by her sister. She's escaped with her life—but brought baggage that jeopardizes her future. When her past threatens her once more, Clover Springs rallies around to help.

When Lady Emma Grace Hastings receives a much-coveted invitation to the most auspicious Christmas party of the season—one that comes with a 10,000 pound prize for the winner of a mysterious game—she cannot believe her good fortune. But as the guests are assembled at Mistlethwaite Manor, the chilling intent of the game is revealed. Each guest has cause for alarm, because all of them have secrets, and to win the prize money, those secrets must be exposed.

My heart is thumping with fear as I stare out at the snow-capped mountains. This ski trip to the French Alps was meant to be a chance for me and my two sisters to put the past behind us after years of not speaking. Instead, I'm expecting the police to knock on the door of our chalet. I'd planned for our families to get to know each other, sipping hot chocolate while laughing together around the fireplace. I didn't think our winter getaway would end in murder.

I gasp out loud as I step through the door of the beautiful country hotel. My hands fly to my mouth in shock as I see the room is filled with my friends and family, my grown-up daughters and grandchildren at the center, gathered to celebrate my special birthday. Everyone raises their glasses to toast me. I should be enjoying the moment, but I'm on edge and I can't relax. Who organized this surprise party? How did they know I was going to be here?

When Adelaide Rosebourne must impersonate her mistress for a few days, it doesn’t seem like it’ll be a difficult task, even if her mistress’s supposed fiancé is in a coma. All she has to do is wait until he wakes up and then convince him to retract the proposal—thereby securing a tidy reward. What she doesn’t count on is the arrival of the duke’s brother and his damned inconvenient interest in her affairs. But does it really matter? She’ll be gone before he finds out the truth.

Only fourteen, Stella Infuriati is the youngest member of her town's resistance network during World War II. Risking imprisonment and death, she relays messages, supplies, and weapons to partisan groups in the Tuscan Hills. Her parents have no idea, consumed instead by love and fear for their beloved son, Achille, a courier and unofficial mechanic for a communist brigade fighting the fascists.