Showing results by narrator "Carlotta Brentan" in All Categories

Sulien ap Gwien was seventeen when the Jarnish raiders came. Had she been armed when they found her, she could have taken them all. As it was, it took six of them to subdue her. She will never forgive them. Thus begins her story-a story that takes her back to her family, with its ancient ties to the Vincan empire that once ruled in Tir Tanagiri, and forward to Caer Tanaga, where the greatest man of his time, King Urdo, struggles to bind together the squabbling nobles and petty princes into a unified force that will drive out the barbarian invader and restore the King's Peace.

The story of the Giro d'Italia—Italy's equivalent of the Tour de France, and its superior in the eyes of many—is as dramatic and full of extraordinary characters as the story of Italy itself. Heroism, suffering, feuds and betrayals, tradition under threat from modernity all play out against a timeless landscape. The iconic riders, mythical stories and career-defining exploits are conveyed in rich, vibrant prose.

Like many before her, Maria Lagana has come to Hollywood to outrun her past. Born in Rome, where every Sunday her father took her to the cinema instead of church, Maria immigrates with her mother to Los Angeles after a childhood transgression leads to her father's arrest. Fifteen years later, on the eve of America's entry into World War II, Maria is an associate producer at Mercury Pictures, trying to keep her personal and professional lives from falling apart.

1938, Italy. Six-year-old Lia loves to build sandcastles at the beach and her biggest problem is her shyness and quiet, birdlike voice—until prime minister Mussolini joins forces with Hitler in World War II, and everything changes. Now there are laws saying Jewish children can’t go to school, Jews can’t work, or go on vacation. It’s difficult for Lia to understand why this is happening to her family. When her father loses his job, they must give up their home and move from city to city.

Evan Taft has plans. Take a gap year in Alaska, make sure his brother and single mother are taken care of, and continue therapy to process his father's departure. But after his mum's unexpected cancer diagnosis, and as Evan's plans begin to fade, he hears something - a song no one else can hear, the voice of a mysterious singer... Shosh Bell has dreams. A high school theatre legend, she's headed to performing arts college in LA, a star on the rise. But when a drunk driver takes her sister's life, that star fades to black. All that remains is a void - and a soft voice singing in her ear.

Med school dropout Lena is desperate for a job, any job, to help her parents, who are approaching bankruptcy after her father was injured and laid off nearly simultaneously. So when she is offered a position, against all odds, working for one of Boston’s most elite families, the illustrious and secretive Verdeaus, she knows she must accept—no matter how bizarre the interview or how vague the job description. By day, she is assistant to the family doctor and his charge—the sickly, poetic, drunken heir to the family empire, who is as difficult as his illness is mysterious.

Welcome to picturesque Provence, where the Lady of the Chateau, Séraphine Demargelasse, has opened its elegant doors to her granddaughter Darcy and three friends. Twenty years earlier, the four girlfriends studied abroad together in France and visited the old woman on the weekends, creating the group’s deep bond. But why this sudden invitation? Amid winery tours, market visits and fancy dinners overlooking olive groves and lavender fields, it becomes clear that each woman has a hidden reason for returning. Then, following a wild evening’s celebration, Séraphine is found brutally murdered.

Eli Whittaker only wants one thing: to find out who is selling American secret codes across Europe, arrest them, and go home to his sensible life in Washington, DC. He has one lead—a letter the culprit sent from a Viennese hotel. But when he arrives in Vienna, he is immediately swept up into a chaotic whirlwind of balls, spies, waltzes, and beautiful hotelkeepers who seem to constantly find themselves in danger. He disapproves of all of it! But his disapproval is tested as he slowly falls deeper into the chaos—and as his attraction to said hotelkeeper grows.

Mary used to be such a nice girl. She was the resident whiz kid of Liberty Lake, Minnesota—the quiet, chubby teen with the scholarship to an Ivy League school. But three years later, “Ivy League Mary” is back—a thinner, cynical, restless failure who was kicked out of Cor­nell at the beginning of her senior year and won’t tell anyone why. Taking a job at the local grocery store, Mary tries to make sense of her life’s sharp downward spiral.

Ten years after graduation, a group of friends plan a reunion in a remote house in upstate New York. It isn't a bachelor party, as they've led one of their friends to believe, but instead an intervention for an escalating drug addiction. They lost one member of their friendship group in college, and they'll do anything to make sure that doesn't happen again. But from the moment they arrive, something doesn't feel right.

This collection includes Irish Soda Bread Murder by Carlene O'Connor, An Irish Recipe for Murder by Peggy Ehrhart, and Mrs. Claus and the Sinister Soda Bread Man by Liz Ireland.

As golden sunlight shimmers across the crystal-clear waters, Francesca travels to the tranquil Italian island of Santa Caterina in search of precious rare books and a new beginning. Heartbroken after the sudden end of her long-term relationship, she jumped at the chance to help recover a collection of missing books. But when she arrives, she soon discovers she was invited by the island’s mysterious owner, alongside handsome local book collector Thiago, to unlock a secret that spans generations. Together, she and Thiago learn the books were hidden during the Second World War.

Alice Bassi is (a little) over 30, single (not by choice), and she can’t help but feel that she is failing at this whole adulthood thing. She’s stuck in a dead-end job, just found out her ex-boyfriend is engaged to his pregnant girlfriend, and Richard Gere hasn’t shown up with flowers and a limo to save her from it all. On one particularly disastrous morning - when Alice would much rather have stayed home, curled up with her favorite rom-coms - she meets Davide Nardi

Teodora di Sangro is used to hiding her magical ability to transform enemies into music boxes and mirrors. Nobody knows she’s a strega - and she aims to keep it that way. The she meets Cielo - and everything changes. A strega who can switch outward form effortlessly, Cielo shows Teodora what her life could be like if she masters the power she’s been keeping secret. And not a moment too soon: The ruler of Vinalia has poisoned the patriarchs of the country’s five controlling families, including Teodora’s father, and demands that each family send a son to the palace.

1918 - America is at war with Germany, and, for the first time in history, the US Navy has allowed women to join up alongside the men. Ten thousand of them rush to do their part. German-American Marjory Kunwald enlists in the Navy to prove her patriotism. Suffragette Blanche Lawrence to prove that women are the equal of men. And shy preacher’s daughter Viv Weston in a desperate attempt to hide from the police.

When the Nazi occupation of Rome begins, two courageous young women are plunged deep into the Italian Resistance to fight for their freedom in this captivating debut novel.

Eighteen-year-old Jane Reye is a psychic artist. She draws what she sees, and what she sees are spirits and the supernatural. Growing up orphaned, she’s now of legal age and can no longer return to the girls' school she’s called home for most of her life. Lost and alone after the death of her lifelong friend, she receives an invitation to partake in a study at the English manor Fairfax Hall: an investigation of the property that requires her specific area of expertise.

Every year, the senior class at Lincoln High plays assassin. Lia Prince has been planning her strategy for years, and she's psyched that not only does she finally get to play, she's on a team with Devon Diaz. But this year, the game isn't any fun - it's real. Abby Ascher, Ben Barnard, and Cassidy Clarke have all turned up...dead. Can Lia stop the ABC killer before he reaches D?

It's 1948, and Irene Willard has had five miscarriages. She's desperate to give her beloved husband the child he desperately desires and, now pregnant for the sixth time, checks in to an isolated house-cum-hospital run by a husband-and-wife team of doctors who are pioneering a cure, they say, to 'rectify the maternal environment'.

On the heels of a difficult break-up and a devastating diagnosis, Shakespearean scholar Lizzie Delford decides to take one last lavish vacation on Elba, the sun-kissed island off the Italian coast, with her best friend and his movie-star boyfriend. Once settled into a luxurious seaside resort, Lizzie has to make big decisions about her future, and she needs the one thing she may be running out of: time.