Showing results by narrator "Samantha Desz" in All Categories

Single mom Annie has spent years rebuilding her life and trying not to have regrets. After giving up her dream of music stardom, she returned to her Adirondack hometown—and convinced herself she’s content with a simpler life. A divorced dad, Seth Taggart used to be a successful LA songwriter. But now his reputation is in tatters, he’s burnt out, and estranged from his adult son. Inheriting a small-town radio station just might be the do-over he needs. When working with Annie turns into sharing music and more, Seth realizes second chances—and home—are where he least expects.

Winter is descending on Bad Axe County, and this year it is bringing something darker with it. On an abandoned lot, a strange new religious sect has built a compound, armed with guns and stoking fears in town. Rumors of sadistic rituals and a planned takeover abound, and when one of the sect’s members is murdered, panic sets in. Sheriff Heidi Kick may not be a fan of the group, but she is also dismayed when the locals form a posse to get rid of them.

Haddie Kellar is passionate about three things: her marriage, her doctorate in botany, and women’s rights. It’s the injustices of the latter that sends her conscience plummeting into a dark lens of how to level the playing field, even if it goes against the grain of morality. After creating a gel that alters the personality, Haddie feels invincible after women from all over take action against men who have wronged them.

From the author of the “engrossing historical epic” (Booklist) The Scribe of Siena comes a thrilling tale set in the crumbling city of Mystras, Greece, in which a scientist’s vacation with her young son quickly turns into a fight for their lives after they cross paths with a man out of time.

Desi is the mastermind behind her dream getaway house. Nestled high into the mountains of North Carolina, it is a sleek place, a luxurious place, a dark place. A place full of secrets. Secrets about the man she longs for, a man who is not her husband. Secrets about the roots of her family that must never, ever, see the light of day. When Desi and her family arrive from Chicago to spend the summer in the mountains, the seeds for the tumultuous months to follow are planted - her marriage on the rocks, not knowing which way they’ll go.

This guide will show you how to take your health into your own hands. You will no longer sit on the sidelines - instead you can play an active and empowered role in the state of your own health. This book will help you: understand how the environment and your genes interact; learn how to use your own genetic information to your advantage; create an actionable plan based on your genomics to radically transform your health and improve your vitality; and discover how to improve your health span and lead a productive, happy, and healthy life.

Sheriff Heidi Kick has a dead body on her hands, a homeless young man last seen alive miles from the Bad Axe. Chillingly, the medical examiner confirms what Sheriff Kick has been experiencing in her own reoccurring nightmares of late: The victim was buried alive. As the relentless summer heat bears down and more bodies are discovered, Sheriff Kick also finds herself embroiled in a nasty reelection campaign.

The Mississippi. The Missouri. The Ohio. America’s rivers are the very lifeblood of our country. We need them for nourishing crops, for cheap bulk transportation, for hydroelectric power, for fresh drinking water. Rivers are also part of our mythology, our collective soul; they are Mark Twain, Led Zeppelin, and the Delta Blues. But as infrastructure across the nation fails and climate change pushes rivers and seas to new heights, we’ve arrived at a critical moment in our battle to tame these often-destructive forces of nature.

A captivating blend of personal history detailing Eleanor’s struggle with issues of marriage, motherhood, financial independence, and femininity, and a vibrant portrait of one of the most famous neighborhoods in the world, this unique work examines the ways that the sensibility, mood, and various inhabitants of the neighborhood influenced the First Lady’s perception of herself and shaped her political views over four decades, up to her death in 1962.

A sweeping, and groundbreaking treasury of the most essential presidential writings, The Best Presidential Writing features a mix of the beloved and the little-known, from stirring speeches and shrewd remarks to behind-the-scenes drafts and unpublished autobiographies.

It’s a time for celebration in Bad Axe County as the town gathers for the annual Syttende Mai - Norwegian Independence Day - festival. During this rollicking family-oriented event filled with dancing and food, Sheriff Heidi Kick discovers a dark and shocking event - a migrant worker has been savagely beaten but refuses to explain what happened. Then, a sudden murder of a band member shatters the festival. Something is deeply wrong in Bad Axe County.

When a traveling carnival stops in the sleepy countryside, 16-year-old Josie Crowley is psyched to go with her new friend, Freya. But what started out as a fun-filled night of games, candied apples, and Ferris wheel rides quickly spirals into a gut-wrenching encounter with one of the carnival attractions. Once the excitement is over, Lamison is missing one of its residents. When Freya is nowhere to be found, Josie suspects the carnival has something to do with her disappearance.

Not only did her father abandon her five years ago, now 17-year-old Marianna Bertagnoli is being uprooted and forced to move with her mother and new stepdad to a creepy Victorian house they inherited in the even creepier town of Flocksdale. Marianna notices some strange qualities about her new home, and soon realizes she's living in none other than the infamous House of Horrors. The very house where the demented Garrett family ran a drug ring, leading to the kidnappings and murders of 40 young girls.

Wendi Wise is a troubled young woman who snorts her breakfast through a straw and spends more time in rehab than in the real world. Her life is seemingly out of control. But now she has a plan. That plan involves a sharp set of butcher knives. She's going back to where all of her troubles began...Flocksdale. Wendi was lured away from a local skating rink, at the age of 13, and held captive in a place she calls The House of Horrors. Dumped off blindfolded on the side of a dirt road, Wendi soon discovered that she was addicted to the drugs they fed her while she was captive.

Lucinda's boyfriend Dracula claims to be the Dracula - he sleeps in a coffin, hunts pigeons for blood, and only goes out at night. But is he really? Unsettlingly, there has been a spate of recent disappearances and Dracula may be connected. Lucinda doesn't know for sure or which is more dangerous: dating an immortal vampire or a UPS driver with a night shift who thinks he's one?

Soon, Rebecca Gray won't be able to see. Diagnosed in her 20s with a degenerative eye disease, each day her world grows a little darker. She's moved to the suburbs to raise her son, Jackson. In the wake of her husband's death, it should be a quieter, easier way of life.

Memphis "M" Engel is stubborn to a fault, graced with an almost absurd knowledge of long-lost languages and cultures, and a heck of an opponent in a fight. In short: She's awesome. Ashwin “Ash” Sood is a little too posh for M's tastes, a little too good-looking, and has way too many secrets. He desperately wants the ancient map M inherited from her archaeologist father, believing it will lead him to a relic with the power to destroy the world. M obviously can't trust him.

Single mother Lee has the daily routine down to a science: shower in six minutes. Cut food into perfect squares. Never leave her on-the-spectrum son Mason in someone else’s care. She’ll do anything - anything - to keep his carefully constructed world from falling apart. Do anything to keep him safe. But when her best friend Grace convinces her she needs a small break from motherhood to recharge her batteries, Lee gives in to a weekend trip. Surely a long weekend away from home won’t hurt?

We know that homophobia harms LGBT individuals in many ways, but economist M. V. Lee Badgett argues that in addition to moral and human rights reasons for equality, we can now also make a financial argument. Finding that homophobia and transphobia cost 1 percent or more of a country's GDP, Badgett expertly uses recent research and statistics to analyze how these hostile practices and environments affect both the US and global economies.

After years of skilled work and dedication, Trisha Donahue is denied a well-earned promotion by her company's male executives, who give it instead to an underqualified man. Devastated, forty-four-year-old Trisha begins to reckon with the demands that exhaust her, the injustices that confront her, and the ways she has betrayed herself "just to fit in" with coworkers who resent and belittle her abilities. But at the Rose & Emerald, her company's annual Banquet Day sets in motion a surprising adventure, revealing unexpected allies, hidden passageways, and an interstellar secret.