Showing results by narrator "Ellen Archer" in All Categories

A young woman survives the unthinkable in this stunning and emotionally satisfying tale of family, love, and resilience, set against the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE.

Normal. Who is to say what this word means? For Magda Newman, it was a goal. She wanted her son Nathaniel to be able to play on the playground, swim at the beach, enjoy the moments his friends took for granted. But Nathaniel’s severe Treacher Collins syndrome - a craniofacial condition - meant that other concerns came first. Could he eat without the aid of a gastrointestinal tube? Could he hear? Would he ever be able to breathe effortlessly? But Nathaniel looks at “normal” from a completely different perspective.

Ignatius Lohman longs to make his mark, to be someone. But in a world populated entirely by superpowered beings, he’s nothing but a powerless white-collar civilian. Iggy’s plight is not helped by the fact that his father, General Lancelot Lohman of the defense agency PEERLESS, is one of the most powerful men on the planet. Then, suddenly and unexpectedly, Iggy finds himself in the crosshairs of Erle P. Van Owen, a megalomaniacal corporate overlord with the astonishing ability to neutralize any superpower.

Small businesses are the backbone of the US economy. They are the biggest job creators and offer a path to the American dream. But for many, it is difficult to get the capital they need to operate and succeed. In the Great Recession, access to capital for small businesses froze and in the aftermath, many community banks shuttered their doors and other lenders that had weathered the storm turned to more profitable avenues. For years after the financial crisis, the outlook for many small businesses was bleak. But then a new dawn of financial technology, or 'fintech', emerged. 

A vital and sweeping examination of today's "boy crisis", demonstrating the ways in which we raise boys into a culture of toxic masculinity and offering solutions that can liberate us all. Whether they're being urged to "man up" or warned that "boys don't cry", young men are subjected to damaging messages about manliness: They must muzzle their emotions and never show weakness, dominate girls and compete with one another. Boys: What It Means to Become a Man examines how these toxic rules can hinder boys' emotional and social development.

America meant "freedom" to the immigrants of the early 1900s - but a freedom very different from what they expected. Cities were crowded and jobs were scare. Children had to work selling newspapers, delivering goods, and laboring sweatshops. In this touching book, Newberry Medalist Russell Freedman offers a rare glimpse of what it meant to be a young newcomer to America.

A lyrical work of narrative nonfiction that portrays how the largest domestic oil discovery in half a century transformed a forgotten corner of the American West into a crucible of breakneck capitalism. As North Dakota became the nation's second-largest oil producer, Maya Rao set out in steel-toe boots to join a wave of drifters, dreamers, entrepreneurs, and criminals. With an eye for the dark, absurd, and humorous, Rao fearlessly immersed herself in their world to chronicle this modern-day gold rush, from its heady beginnings to OPEC's price war against the US oil industry.

A wedding dress passed down through generations unravels the tangled threads of three women's lives in a novel of friendship, family, and forgiveness from the USA Today best-selling author of Ten Beach Road.

Several years ago, ecologist Lauren E. Oakes set out from California for Alaska's old-growth forests to hunt for a dying tree: the yellow-cedar. With climate change as the culprit, the death of this species meant loss for many Alaskans. Oakes and her research team wanted to chronicle how plants and people could cope with their rapidly changing world. Amidst the standing dead, she discovered the resiliency of forgotten forests, flourishing again in the wake of destruction, and a diverse community of people who persevered to create new relationships with the emerging environment.

For Magda Newman, normal was a goal—she wanted her son Nathaniel to be able to play on the playground, swim at the beach, enjoy the moments of childhood that are often taken for granted. But Nathaniel's severe Treacher Collins syndrome—a craniofacial condition—meant that other concerns came first. Could he eat without the aid of a gastrointestinal tube? Could he hear? Would he ever be able to breathe effortlessly?

Cuddle up with your little one and listen to these three bedtime Bible favorites: Goodnight, Manger and Goodnight, Ark by Laura Sassi, and Goodnight, Angels by Melody Carlson.

Aylin's body was found in her garden, her hair immaculately styled as usual. Her death came as a shock - after all, who would have wanted someone so admired and talented dead? Who - among the many she'd helped, the few she'd hurt, and all those she'd left behind - might have been driven to murder?

The moment a mysterious boy moves in next door to Sydney and Allyson Tate, both of their lives begin to change in ways that neither of them can ignore. When Allyson meets Graham Copeland, she instantly feels like he's a kindred spirit - shy and awkward like her, someone who has trouble making friends. It's almost impossible to resist having a crush on him.

Hedda Chase is a top-flight executive producer at Gladiator Films, fast-tracked in the business since she graduated from Yale. An aggressive businesswoman, she recently pulled the plug on a film project initiated by one of her predecessors. The screenwriter on the project was Hugh Waters, a wannabe with a dead-end marriage and a day job at an insurance company. This script was his ticket out - and now he's out for revenge.

To fulfill her destiny as the Wanderer of legend, Ilythra needs to find the last of the Triune Stones. But its music has gone silent, its owner, the dark sorcerer Bredych, nowhere to be seen except in her dreams. Dreams that are getting ever more frequent, and more troubling. Unrest is sweeping the land, and Ilythra's allies are paying the price as Bredych subsumes more and more kingdoms to his will. Armed with only her sword and her friends-stoic elderborn Arien and passionate warrior-prince Ryliann-she sets out to win her people back and train them to fight for themselves.

Ilythra the Wanderer has escaped brainwashing by the merciless sorcerer Bredych, but she's far from safe. As Bredych seizes power in the kingdom of Greton, Ilythra staggers north with a magic stone he covets, fleeing his murderous trackers. There in the mist, she finds the Siobani and the final Triune Stone. Ilythra's quest won't be complete until she recovers the stone still in Bredych's possession and uses it to mend the wounds of the world.

Awakening in a bleak landscape as scarred as her body, Cass Dollar vaguely recalls surviving something terrible. Having no idea how many weeks have passed, she slowly realizes the horrifying truth: Ruthie has vanished. And with her, nearly all of civilization. Where once-lush hills carried cars and commerce, the roads today see only cannibalistic Beaters - people turned hungry for human flesh by a government experiment gone wrong.

In the heart of Louisiana, Amanda Trent has arrived at her cousin's plantation to find Amelia's death looming over the war-torn grounds. There is a dark secret in the shadows around every corner and in the heart of Amelia's widower, Jason Monteigne. Amanda only wants to leave the haunted home but an accident has ensnared her in a tangled web of mystery, passion and hidden desire. What is it that haunts Jason's every moment and will Amanda discover the truth of her cousin's death?

Lula, a 26 -year-old Albanian woman living surreptitiously in New York City on an expiring tourist visa, hopes to make a better life for herself in America. When she lands a job as caretaker to Zeke, a rebellious high school senior in suburban New Jersey, it seems that the security, comfort, and happiness of the American dream may finally be within reach. Her new boss, Mister Stanley, an idealistic college professor turned Wall Street executive, assumes that Lula is a destitute refugee of the Balkan wars.

From the author of The Heretic’s Daughter, an epic Texan adventure of love, loss, and kinship. Greed. Desire. Death. Love.... It's the 19th century on the Gulf Coast of Texas, a time of opportunity and lawlessness. Lucinda is intelligent, passionate, wily, and courageous - a woman who braves her affliction and risks her own life to pursue her lover, a man as charismatic as he is ruthless.