Publisher: Rose Rough
Kate's always working overtime, but tonight she's going to get a visit from building security. And soon she'll be bent over her desk while her new master teaches her a hard lesson in submission. Working overtime has never been so much rough fun!
Andrea is at the top of her game as a social media guru. But then an unexpected tragedy strikes, and she's called back to the one place she vowed never to return to. Going back to Oak Harbor meant returning to the source of her pain. She wasn't planning on staying. Why would she when the one person who hurt her the most, the one person whose validation she's needed more than anything has passed? But, when her sister, Cora needs help to care for their sick mother and to run the family business, she has no choice but to extend her stay. She is forced to address her resentment toward her mother and her feeling of abandonment from her sister. An old flame resurfaces and threatens her perfect relationship with her daughter. When news comes that he has died, Andrea is faced with a dilemma—tell her daughter the truth or take it to her grave. And when an opportunity for love starts out with a crash she is hesitant to dive into this uncharted territory. How will Andrea navigate the different relationships she's had to deal with since her return to Oak Harbor? Can she save her relationship with her daughter if she tells her the truth? Can she have the ending she's always dreamed of?Show book
In the town of Bonneville, good people lose limbs, fight lightning, and slip into sinkholes. They pitch over bicycles, tumble off ladders, and expire without warning. They spin the wheel and take their chances. It’s all in a day’s work. Some blame God, others blame kismet, and still others rail against random happenstance. All told, maybe there are no accidents.Show book
A quiet, contemplative tale steeped in atmosphere and artistic beauty. A painter retreats to a seaside cottage in search of rest and inspiration, but soon begins to sense strange presences along the shore and beneath the waves. Are they ghosts, sea ghouls, or beings older than time itself? The answers drift just out of reach, like mist over the ocean. The story focuses on the sensations and intuitions of the main character, imbuing the whole narrative with an evocative taste of elusive dread, quite distinct from overt horror. The Night Ocean has long been part of the Lovecraftian canon, even though a manuscript discovered in the early 2000s, with Lovecraft’s revisions, reveals that only 10% of ‘The Night Ocean’ can be attributed to the writer from Providence. This realization underscores how sensitive and precocious the eighteen-year-old Robert H. Barlow was at the time. It stands as the last existing work of fiction in which Lovecraft participated.Show book
Winifred Holtby was born on 23rd June 1898 to a prosperous farming family in the village of Rudston in Yorkshire. A governess provided her early education before she went to Queen Margaret's School in Scarborough. After passing the entrance exam for Somerville College, Oxford in 1917, she decided to join the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps in early 1918. However, soon after her arrival in France, the War ended. She returned to study at Oxford and met fellow student Vera Brittain. After graduating from Oxford, in 1921, Winifred and Vera moved to London, hoping to establish themselves as authors. Her early novels met with only moderate success but as a journalist she was both prolific and increasingly well-known. Her articles graced more than 20 newspapers and magazines, including the Manchester Guardian newspaper. Winifred was a committed feminist, socialist and pacifist. She gave many lectures for the League of Nations Union. She was also active in the Independent Labour Party and was a campaigner for the unionisation of black workers in South Africa. In 1931 the symptoms of high blood pressure, recurrent headaches and bouts of lassitude brought forth a diagnosis of Bright's disease. She was given two years to live and now put all her efforts into what was to become her crowning achievement: South Riding. Released posthumously it received lavish praise and enormous sales. Her canon of works tackle difficult subjects head on, many in unusual ways, brimming with verve and usually strong female protagonists. Winifred Holtby died on 29th September 1935 in London. She was 37.Show book
Vladimir Galaktionovich Korolenko was born in Zhytomyr, Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire on 27th July 1853. His father died when he was 13 and life was then often struck with bouts of poverty, which resulted in his education being somewhat erratic. A spell in exile at 23 was followed by another as the politics of the times opposed his volatile but heart-felt passions. Writing was also coming to the fore and in 1879 his debut short story telling of a young Narodnik searching for social and spiritual identity, was published. In 1881, Korolenko refused to swear allegiance to the new Russian Tsar and was again exiled, this time much farther afield. He spent the next three years doing manual work, but took time to study local customs and history. These impressions in exile provided rich material for his writings. In 1885 he was allowed to settle in Nizhny, where again he repeatedly questioned the authorities. That same year ‘Makar's Dream’ established his literary reputation and was part of his first collection ‘Sketches and Stories’, the following year. In the early 1890’s when famine struck Central Russia, he went to work on relief missions, collecting donations, supervising the delivery and distribution of food, opening 45 free canteens, all this while writing the graphic reports that would later be published as ‘In the Year of Famine’ in 1893. By 1896 despite some psychological disorders, he was well regarded amongst Russian writers and was even a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Throughout his writing career Korolenko was a staunch advocate of human rights, putting that sacred activity above what he called his 'part-time-writing'. In the Revolutionary year of 1905, under his editorship, Russkoye Bogatstvo published the Manifest by the Petersburg Soviet of the Workers' deputies. Korolenko was now repeatedly harassed by the authorities, had his flat raided many times and materials confiscated. As a lifetime opponent of Tsarism, he guardedly welcomed the Revolution of 1917. Once the nature of Bolshevism was established, he soon started to criticize it. During the Russian Civil War that ensued, he condemned both the Red Terror and the White Terror. Despite suffering from a progressive heart disorder, he collected food packages for children in famine-stricken Moscow and Petrograd as well as organised orphanages and shelters for the homeless. Vladimir Korolenko died in Poltava, Ukraine, of the complications of pneumonia on 25th December 1921. He was 68.Show book
Edited by the bestselling author of The Ice Harvest, St. Louis Noir thickens the Midwest quotient for the Akashic Noir series. Akashic Books continues its groundbreaking series of original noir anthologies. Each story is set in a distinct neighborhood or location within the city of the book. In the wake of Chicago Noir, Twin Cities Noir, and Kansas City Noir—all popular volumes in the Akashic Noir Series—comes the latest Midwest installment, St. Louis Noir. Masterfully curated by Scott Phillips, author of The Ice Harvest (adapted for film, starring John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton), this volume will chill the listener with heartland menace. Featuring brand new stories by Calvin Wilson, LaVelle Wilkins-Chinn, John Lutz, Paul D. Marks, Colleen J. McElroy, Jason Makansi, S. L. Coney, Michael Castro, Laura Benedict, Jedidiah Ayres, Umar Lee, Chris Barsanti, L. J. Smith, and Scott Phillips.Show book
