Showing results by narrator "Beth Richmond" in All Categories

In 1847, Marjory Turner struggles with the difficult journey west to the Oregon Territory, recording her feelings in her journal. On the cusp of womanhood, she is ill equipped to deal with the hardships after her father dies in an accident midway through the journey. The already-strained relationship with her mother grows worse as her mother's behavior becomes more mysteriously irrational and Marjory is forced to take on the responsibility of her much younger siblings. But the trials strengthen Marjory.

A rattlesnake fang pegged in a teenager's eye is just the beginning of a spring day for Posadas Undersheriff Estelle Guzman. The injured lad's older brother goes missing, and is found dead in an arroyo, apparently killed by his cartwheeling ATV. But most puzzling is what the dead boy found moments before he was killed...an astonishing discovery that takes deputies back to a five year-old killing. Estelle and the now retired Bill Gastner find themselves looking for a murderer altogether too close to home.

This love story takes place in Germany between the years 1936 and 1943. At the age of 17, Erna Neuman and Hans Traber fall in love. Nazi laws force their separation because Erna is Jewish. During World War II, Traber, now a soldier in the German army, finds Erna under circumstances that compel him to rescue her. Gradually and tenderly, their first love is re-awakened as he attempts to take her to safety on a perilous journey to Switzerland. He fails....

Louie Cameron, once a successful architect and musician, now a vagabond, is wounded while defending a damsel in distress, which leads him to become entangled in the lives of Andrea, an artist and professor, and her parents, habitués of a remote beach house in northern California. The blossoming of deep love between Louie and Andrea gives Louie the courage to return to Santa Cruz to make peace with Marie, the former love of his life, with unforeseen and startling consequences.

Throughout his career, Johnny Cash was depicted - and depicted himself - as a walking contradiction: social protestor and establishment patriot, drugged wildman and devout Christian crusader, rebel outlaw hillbilly thug and elder statesman. Leigh H. Edwards explores the allure of this paradoxical image and its cultural significance. She argues that Cash embodied irresolvable contradictions of American identity that reflect foundational issues in the American experience.

In 1985, Catherine DeMarco spent one hot July night where she shouldn’t have been, doing something she shouldn’t have been doing. This was a fatal mistake. Now Jimmy Taggart is sitting on death row. Details of that night are still hazy in his mind but the evidence was conclusive. No one believed in his innocence then. Only one person believes in it now. Sergeant Samantha Casey fought to clear the name of a Korean War vet in When the Dead Speak.

This is a fast-paced tale of intrigue, deception and betrayal. Madison McKenzie, a vacationing investigative reporter, overhears some old codgers talking about people disappearing, unexplained deaths and activity at the now defunct Annabelle Mine. Curiosity gets the better of her and she decides to investigate. What she unearths is a conspiracy of international proportions.

Just a second. That was all it took. In that second Anita Sherwood sees the face of the young boy in the window of the bus as it stops at the curb...and she knows it is her son. The son who had been kidnapped two years before. The son who had never been found and who had been declared legally dead. But now her son is alive. Anita knows it in her heart. She is certain that the boy is her son, but how can she get anyone to believe her?

Afraid of men, afraid for her sins, afraid for her sanity, and right now afraid for her life, Meggie McMurphy flees Boston once the fiendish terror - so long stalking in her nightmares - surfaces in the light of day. She escapes west to Denver in the wild Colorado Territory, hoping to lose herself among the multitude of townsfolk. The year is 1874. Twenty-five years old, alone, and near penniless, Meggie struggles to find honest work and to keep the dark secrets of her past just that: a secret. Not so easily done....

Former homicide detective, Sam Casey, finds it hard to stay away from crime scenes, especially those where victims have died violently, and where the killers are still unknown. Centuries-old skeletal remains of Native Americans along with artifacts are discovered during the construction of a downtown office building. Sam has a difficult time deciphering her visions of two moons and the sound of gravel crunching until she realizes the two moons are headlights.

One week before her wedding a young woman strips, takes the time to fold her clothes, then calmly walks into Lake Michigan. When Sam Casey is asked to look into the death of a young mother who left her infant in a high chair, walked down the street and jumped off the overpass, Sam finds a strange similarity-they each received a phone call just prior to committing suicide. Both calls were from disposable phones and both calls lasted four seconds. Were these really suicides or something more sinister?

Although drinking alcoholic beverages is legal for those 21 years and older in the United States, alcohol is a dangerous drug when misused or abused by those of any age. One of the most commonly used drugs among teens and adults, alcohol affects areas of the brain that influence pleasure, impulses, and coordination. Long-term abuse of alcohol has devastating effects on one's health and can be fatal to the user.

A body is discovered in a cement pillar. Clasped in his hand is a gold pin shaped like a lightning bolt. What secret did he carry to his grave and why is someone hell-bent on keeping that secret buried? Detective Sergeant Samantha Casey is more than just a cop. She is part Native American with a unique ability to hear the dead speak. They tell her secrets about their life and death. And sometimes what she learns can get her killed.

Hetta Coffey is a globe-trotting civil engineer with attitude who is working on coming of age, a little late. Pushing forty and still single, Hetta is the epitome of the "B" word: bold, bossy, brassy, breezy, and brash. After leaving a lifelong swath of failed multinational affairs in her jet stream, it is no wonder Hetta prefers living with her dog, R.J. But old habits die hard, and trolling for triceps is Hetta's hobby....

Spunky young grandma Cealie Gunther tries to avoid her hunky sometimes-ex lover Gil Thurman so she can rediscover herself. She also wants to avoid relatives so she won't become dependent on them. But a cousin who antagonized her in childhood pleads for Cealie to come to Gatlinburg, TN, needing Cealie's help or she'll face dire consequences. And Gil couldn't be opening another of his Cajun Delights restaurants there - could he? Torn between flying off for her planned exotic vacation or landing in the hills of Tennessee, Cealie knows where she must go. She can't believe what she finds once she gets there....

Anthony Wright made a career of getting what he wanted, whatever the price. When he's murdered and ends up as a late night snack for the zoo's 15-foot crocodile, few are shedding any tears. After police arrest the lead crocodile handler, it's up to zookeeper Lavender "Snake" Jones to prove her friend's innocence. But is she really helping? Each lie she exposes only serves to strengthen the case against him, rattles her belief in those she trusts and, in the end, threatens her own safety.

Cris Pereira hates starring in a cautionary tale. Alas, her recent heartbreak relegates her to this unbecoming fate. The only good thing about being dumped a foot from the altar is the newest layer to her punchy sarcasm. All she wants is a do-over, but this is not your average fairy tale, and wishes don't come true in the real world.

Male batterers of women are being beaten to death by a bat-wielding female vigilante. Each victim had recently been on trial for domestic violence-related charges, but was set free through plea bargains, technicalities, or acquittal. Two Portland Police Bureau Detectives - Sergeant Ray Barkley and his partner Detective Nina Parker - investigate the killings. Among the list of suspects is Criminal Court Judge Carole Cranston, who presided over the trials of all the victims and has dark secrets she is in no hurry to share. Barkley quickly develops an attraction to the beautiful Carole....

It's RN Gina Mazzio's wedding eve. But when she takes the week's final Ob/Gyn telephone advice call, a deadly serious male voice says, "She's all cut up." The police, the hospital administrator, and even Gina's fiancé, Harry Lucke, insist it was only a crank call, some sicko getting his Friday evening jollies. Gina doesn't buy it. After a second similar call, at her home, she starts to link the calls and caller with a series of nurse disappearances.

Modern dance was a movement that began at the turn of the 20th century when American dancers Loie Fuller, Isadora Duncan, and Ruth St. Denis broke from formal dance traditions with their own personal vision of movement. Soon, their visions evolved through Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey, and Charles Weidman, who would all go on to teach their methods and present modern dance as a serious art form.