Showing results by narrator "Amy Rubinate" in All Categories

When Jennifer arrived at Madame Chic's Parisian apartment as a foreign exchange student, Madame Chic took her under her wing and tutored her in the secrets of how the French elevate the little things in life to the art of living. Years later, Jennifer was back in California with a husband, two young daughters, a dog, and her first home.

Judy Moody is in it to win it. Win the Book Quiz Blowout, that is. Judy and her brother, Stink, are two-fifths of the Virginia Dare Bookworms, and they’ve been reading up a storm to prepare for Saturday’s face-off against second- and third-grade readers from the next town. Judy’s trying out all kinds of tactics, from hanging upside down like Pippi Longstocking to teaching herself to speed read The Princess in Black, and Stink has fashioned a cape of book trivia sticky notes to help him remember all the penguins in Mr. Popper’s Penguins.

After a devastating fire pitted their families against each other, high school sweethearts Phoebe Ritter and Aidan Payne were torn apart. Twenty years later, Aidan is called back to Blessings, nervous about confronting his painful past. And that's before he knows about the 19-year-old secret Phoebe has been harboring all this time. As Aidan tries to make up for lost time with the family he didn't know he had, Phoebe and Aidan rediscover long-suppressed feelings. But the past won't lie buried, and old enemies threaten to destroy the peace they've fought so hard to find.

Imagining the best way to destroy a person’s happiness is Crystal Love’s favorite game. Devious and unpolished, the plus-sized loan analyst couldn’t be more out of place in her new town of Santa Barbara, where the beautifully manicured women never age and the ocean views stretch farther than the million-dollar lawns. And yet her eye for the power dynamics at play in this tony community is dead accurate. Kathi Wright, on the other hand, has made it her life’s work to fit in with the plastic people who surround her. But when her husband - a wealthy bank president - dies suddenly, she’s left with nothing.

Cassie Simon is a struggling artist living in New York City. When she receives a call from a magistrate telling her she has inherited 60 acres of land in Sweetwater, Tennessee, from her grandfather, whom she never knew, she takes it as a sign: it's time for a change. She moves to the small Southern town where her mother, Ellen, grew up - and where she died tragically when Cassie was three.

Josie Slater has allowed the circumstances anchoring her in Sunset Cove to become a life sentence. Since her mother’s death years before, she’s spent most of her waking hours helping her dad run the Driftwood Diner. As her best friends, Opal and Sophia, make their dreams come true, Josie watches her own art school aspirations drift on by. But when a French-speaking Southern gentleman from her past moves back from Europe, Josie is launched into a tizzy of what-ifs and I-sure-do-hope-sos.

Twelve years ago, Cristan’s wife was murdered. He was forced on the run to keep his infant daughter safe. They’ve finally settled in a small Pennsylvania town, but he can’t shake the feeling that they are being watched. Newly divorced, Sarah is ready to start over. As her ex becomes increasingly hostile, she appreciates help from a neighbor. But the violence she senses beneath Cristan’s polished manners makes her wary.

When the bookshop next to the Honeybee Bakery hosts a signing for a Savannah radio celebrity's new self-help book, magical baker Katie Lightfoot is happy to provide some delectable desserts. The whole spellbook club is going to the event, curious about the book (and maybe to sample some goodies), but the final chapter comes too soon for the author when she is found dead at the event. The prime suspect is Angie Kissel, a former witch whose familiar was once Katie's own terrier, Mungo.

Katie will be marrying firefighter Declan McCarthy in less than a week, and she's still finding time to run the Honeybee Bakery, where she infuses sweets and treats with special spells and cheerful charms. But her hope of getting hitched without a hitch is short-lived. When Declan's family shows up early to enjoy a few extra days in Savannah, his youngest sister finds an unsavory surprise: her ex-husband, dead in a hotel room hours after they argued.

Samantha McAllister looks just like the rest of the popular girls in her junior class. But hidden beneath the straightened hair and expertly applied makeup is a secret that her friends would never understand: Sam has purely obsessional OCD and is consumed by a stream of dark thoughts and worries that she can't turn off. Second-guessing every move, thought, and word makes daily life a struggle, and it doesn't help that her lifelong friends will turn toxic at the first sign of a wrong outfit, wrong lunch, or wrong crush.

When art historian Keira Foley is hired to authenticate a painting at a centuries-old East Suffolk manor, she hopes this is just the thing to get her career and life back on track. But from the time she arrives at Parham Hill Estate and begins working alongside rumored art thief Emory Scott, she’s left with far more questions than answers. Could this lost painting of Queen Victoria be a duplicate of the original Winterhalter masterpiece, and if so, who is the artist? As Keira begins to unravel the mystery behind the portrait, two women emerge from the estate’s forgotten past.

From the moment she met him, Keeley Grant knew there was something wild about Brian Donnelly. He dared to ignore everything that said a poor Irish rogue shouldn't touch her, and battered down every wall she threw at him. But a wild thing by nature cannot be contained, not by convention or fences or even by love. Could she give him everything if he was just going to walk away?

After calling Ireland home for six months, Boston expat Maura Donovan still has a lot to learn about Irish ways - and Sullivan's Pub is her classroom. Maura didn't only inherit a business, she inherited a tight-knit community. And when a tragedy strikes, it's the talk of the pub. A local farmer, out for a stroll on the beach with his young son, has mysteriously disappeared. Did he drown? Kill himself? The child can say only that he saw a boat.

From the USA Today best-selling author of Sunshine Beach, a story of four women trying to rebuild more than their lives. Embroiled in a battle to regain control of their renovation turned reality TV show, Do Over, Maddie, Avery, Nikki, and Kyra find themselves holding tight to the frayed ends of their friendship and relationships.

This bundle includes A Baby of Her Own, A Husband of Her Own, A Family of Her Own, A Home of Her Own, Stranger in Town, Big Girls Don't Cry, The Other Woman, and Coulda Been a Cowboy.

Judy is visiting Grandma Lou one day when she accidentally finds an uber-mysterious list of activities - a Bucket List! Which gives Judy an idea: How rare would it be if she made her own way-official bucket list of all the things she wants to do - before she starts fourth grade? Pretty soon Judy is off and running trying to cross off all her items: learn to do a cartwheel, invent something rad, go to Antarctica (the real one), ride a horse - the list goes on.

After the tragic death of her husband, Aven Norgaard is beckoned to give up her life in Norway to become a housekeeper in the rugged hills of 19th century Appalachia. Upon arrival, she finds herself in the home of her late husband’s cousins - three brothers who make a living by brewing hard cider on their 300-acre farm. Yet even as a stranger in a foreign land, Aven has hope to build a new life in this tight-knit family. But her unassuming beauty disrupts the bond between the brothers.

Snow is a rarity in Maura Donovan's small village in County Cork, Ireland, so she wasn't sure what to expect when a major snowstorm rolled in around Sullivan's pub. But now she's stranded in a bar full of patrons - and a suspected killer in a long-ago murder. Maura's been in Ireland less than a year and hasn't heard about the decades-old unsolved crime that took place nearby, let alone the infamous suspect, Diane Caldwell.

Anna and Bennett were never supposed to meet: she lives in 1995 Chicago and he lives in 2012 San Francisco. But Bennett has the unique ability to travel through time and space, which brings him into Anna's life, and with him a new world of adventure and possibility. As their relationship deepens, the two face the reality that time may knock Bennett back to where he belongs, even as a devastating crisis throws everything they believe into question.

Aven Norgaard understands courage. Orphaned within an Irish workhouse, then widowed at just 19, she voyaged to America where she was wooed and wed by Thor Norgaard, a Deaf man in rural Appalachia. That the Lord saw her along the winding journey and that Aven now carries Thor’s child are blessings beyond measure. Yet while Thor holds her heart, it is his younger brother and rival who haunts her memories: Haakon - whose selfish choices shattered her trust in him.