Showing results by narrator "Barbara McCulloh" in All Categories

Catering a high-class trunk show at Heart's Desire Jewelry is a shining achievement for Theodosia and the Indigo Tea Shop. After all, a slew of jewelers, museums, and private collectors will be there to showcase their wares and sip some of Theo's best blends. But just as Theo settles in to enjoy the fruits of her labor, the party is crashed by a gang of masked muggers who steal the precious gems and jewels on display.

Life may have been hard on Addie French, but when she meets friendless Emma Roby on a train, all her protective instincts emerge. Emma's brother is seeing her off to Nalgitas to marry a man she has never met. And Emma seems like a lost soul to Addie-someone who needs Addie's savvy and wary eye. It isn't often that Addie is drawn to anyone as a friend, but Emma seems different somehow.

When Minerva Jane Jenkins was just 14 years old, she married a man who moved her to the mountains. He carried with him a small box, which he told her was filled with gold. And when he died 50 years later, he made her promise to keep his secret. She is to tell no one about the box or the treasure it contains. Now 94, Minerva is nearing the end of what has sometimes been a lonely life. But she's kept that secret. Even so, rumors of hidden gold have a way of spreading, and Minerva is visited by a reporter, Del Rankin, who wants to know more of her story.

During the Mad Hatter Masquerade, a fundraiser hosted by the Friends of the Opera on the grounds of the old Pendleton Grist Mill, Harlan Sadler, husband of Cricket Sadler, the chairwoman, is killed. He’s been hit in the head with a croquet mallet, and his body hung on the chains and paddles of the grist mill.

In A Surrendered Heart by award-winning authors Tracie Peterson and Judith Miller, 21-year-old Amanda Broadmoor doesn't want to abandon her mentor Dr. Carstead when cholera strikes Rochester, New York, in 1899. But after the Broadmoor fortune is mishandled, Amanda must sacrifice her lofty aspirations to rescue her family from ruin - even if it means marrying a man she can't stand.

After a rough winter spent alone, Ursula Nordegren realizes she must overcome her fears of the outside world and begins a trek down Hope Mountain. Along the way she finds a badly wounded stranger and realizes God may have used her decision to leave as a way of saving the man. Wax Mosby was climbing Hope Mountain in part to atone for his terrible choices. He was hired to drive out the Warden family and now knows he was duped. But when he's wounded during the climb, the last person he expects to rescue him is a beautiful blonde woman with the voice of an angel.

Meet Rose Feller. She's 30 years old and a high-powered attorney with a secret passion for romance novels. She dreams of a man who will slide off her glasses, gaze into her eyes, and tell her that she's beautiful. She also dreams of getting her fantastically screwed-up little sister to get her life. together. Meet Rose's sister, Maggie. Twenty-eight years old, drop-dead gorgeous and only occasionally employed. Although her dreams of big-screen stardom haven't progressed, Maggie dreams of fame and fortune - and of getting her dowdy big sister to stick to a skin-care regime.

Tea maven Theodosia Browning and her tea sommelier, Drayton Conneley, are catering a Victorian Christmas party at a swanky mansion in downtown Charleston. Drucilla Heyward, the hostess, is one of the wealthiest women in town. As the champagne flows and the tea steeps, Drucilla is so pleased with the reception by her partygoers that she reveals her secret plan to Theodosia. However, before she can make the announcement, Theodosia finds her crumpled unconscious in the hallway.

While viewing the harbor's Gaslights and Galleons Parade from the widow's walk of Timothy Neville's Charleston mansion, local banker Carson Lanier seemingly tumbles over a narrow railing, then plunges three stories to his death. But a tragic accident becomes something much more sinister when it's discovered that the victim was first shot with a bolt from a crossbow.

Alice Chesterfield is a woman pursued. Having survived an attack that left her scarred and her father dead, she is never free from the fear and memories of the man who is responsible. Texas seems to be an answer to Alice's prayers, and when she has the opportunity to relocate to a ranch near Dallas, a new man captures Alice's attention. Robert Barnett is unlike any man Alice has ever known: He doesn't seem to mind the scar she bears, nor does he worry about the obstacles that stand in their way.

Allan Gurganus's Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All became an instant classic upon its publication. Critics and fans alike fell in love with the voice of 99-year-old Confederate widow Lucy Marsden, one of the most entertaining and loquacious heroines in American literature. Lucy married at the turn of the 20th century, when she was 15 and her husband was 50. If Colonel William Marsden was a veteran of the "War for Southern Independence", Lucy became a "veteran of the veteran" with a unique perspective on Southern history and Southern manhood.

Meet Bubbles Yablonsky, beautician-reporter-sleuth and blazing star of Strohmeyer’s entertaining, establishment-bashing debut as a mystery writer. Like the mills that gird the book’s seen-better-days steel town of Lehigh, Pa., the city is itself a seething cauldron.

Life in the American West hasn't been easy for French refugee Lorraine Durand. She has precious few connections and longs to return to her native land. So when the man who rescued her from a Parisian uprising following the Franco-Prussian War persuades her to help him with a deadly holdup, she reluctantly agrees. Despite his promises otherwise, the gang kidnaps a man, forcing Lorraine to grapple with the fallout of her choices even as she is drawn to the captive she's meant to guard.

From the time she was a toddler, Lou Ann Walker acted as the ears and voice for her parents, who had lost their hearing at a young age. As soon as she was old enough to speak, her childhood ended, and she immediately assumed the responsibility of interpreter - translating doctors’ appointments and managing her parents’ business transactions. Their family life was warm and loving, but outside the home, they faced a world that misunderstood and often rejected them.

A gifted trainer in a time women are not allowed to race, Nora Fenton prefers horses to men. They're easier to handle, they're more reliable, and they never tell her what to do. After her father's passing, Nora is determined to save her struggling horse farm, starting with entering her prize colt into the harness races at the 1905 Mississippi Fair. If she wins, she may have a chance at independence. But when a stranger arrives and starts asking disconcerting questions, she suspects he may have other motives than unseating her in the training job that is rightfully hers.

In this tale of 1886 Texas, a caring young woman can heal the physical and emotional wounds of others but can’t mend her own hurting heart. As Deborah Vandermark pursues medicine under the tutelage of her beau Dr. Christopher Clayton, she soon realizes her West Texas lumber town isn’t ready for a woman doctor. Yet she has reason to hope - until Christopher abruptly breaks off their blossoming relationship and rushes back home to his family. When truth emerges and Deborah’s dream fades, she fears she must turn back....

The death of Aubrey Willot's wealthy but abusive husband left her with an unborn child, an empty chateau, and the last name of a criminal. When she learns he double-crossed a ruthless business associate, she's forced to accept the protection of the handsome and daring bounty hunter tasked with finding her late husband's fortune. Though Aubrey swore never to trust another man, she can't help but be drawn to the bounty hunter's rugged charm.

Middle-aged divorcee Jenna has received an incredible offer. A friend who directs an international mission wants to send her to Venice for one week to cook for a mission leaders' retreat. Jenna isn't a great cook, so she brings along Sue, her culinary sister-in-law.

Texas born and raised Jessica Atherton is a wealthy young woman whose heart was broken when the man she intended to marry wedded another. But her world is upended when two men come into her life and both manage to stir her heart. Harrison Gable is a rich young lawyer who intends to travel the world and live a life of opulence. His ambitions match Jessica's dreams, but her heart has begun to change.

Texas Ranger Matt Taggert has good reason to believe that Ellie-May Blackwell’s late husband was responsible for a stagecoach holdup. He’s here to see justice done…and find the fortune the thief stashed away in the process. Shaken by her encounter, Ellie-May vows to protect her late husband’s reputation at all costs. Having grown up an outlaw’s daughter, she’ll do anything to save her children from the kind of life she led.