Monday, November 7, 2011

Enduring Love: A Novel (Sydney Cove)

  • ISBN13: 9780800731786
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
On a windy spring day in the Chilterns, the calm, organized life of science writer Joe Rose is shattered when he witnesses a tragic accident: a hot-air balloon with a boy trapped in its basket is being tossed by the wind, and in the attempt to save the child, a man is killed. A stranger named Jed Parry joins Rose in helping to bring the balloon to safety. But unknown to Rose, something passes between Parry and himself on that day--something that gives birth to an obsession in Parry so powerful that it will test the limits of Rose's beloved rationalism, threaten the love of his wife, Clarissa, and drive him to the brink of murder and madness. Brilliant and compassionate, this is a novel of love, faith, ! and suspense, and of how life can change in an instant.Joe Rose has planned a postcard-perfect afternoon in the English countryside to celebrate his lover's return after six weeks in the States. To complete the picture, there's even a "helium balloon drifting dreamily across the wooded valley." But as Joe and Clarissa watch the balloon touch down, their idyll comes to an abrupt end. The pilot catches his leg in the anchor rope, while the only passenger, a boy, is too scared to jump down. As the wind whips into action, Joe and four other men rush to secure the basket. Mother Nature, however, isn't feeling very maternal. "A mighty fist socked the balloon in two rapid blows, one-two, the second more vicious than the first," and at once the rescuers are airborne. Joe manages to drop to the ground, as do most of his companions, but one man is lifted sky-high, only to fall to his death.

In itself, the accident would change the survivors' lives, filling them w! ith an uneasy combination of shame, happiness, and endless se! lf-repro ach. (In one of the novel's many ironies, the balloon eventually lands safely, the boy unscathed.) But fate has far more unpleasant things in store for Joe. Meeting the eye of fellow rescuer Jed Parry, for example, turns out to be a very bad move. For Jed is instantly obsessed, making the first of many calls to Joe and Clarissa's London flat that very night. Soon he's openly shadowing Joe and writing him endless letters. (One insane epistle begins, "I feel happiness running through me like an electrical current. I close my eyes and see you as you were last night in the rain, across the road from me, with the unspoken love between us as strong as steel cable.") Worst of all, Jed's version of love comes to seem a distortion of Joe's feelings for Clarissa.

Apart from the incessant stalking, it is the conditionals--the contingencies--that most frustrate Joe, a scientific journalist. If only he and Clarissa had gone straight home from the airport... If only th! e wind hadn't picked up... If only he had saved Jed's 29 messages in a single day... Ian McEwan has long been a poet of the arbitrary nightmare, his characters ineluctably swept up in others' fantasies, skidding into deepening violence, and--worst of all--becoming strangers to those who love them. Even his prose itself is a masterful and methodical exercise in defamiliarization. But Enduring Love and its underrated predecessor, Black Dogs, are also meditations on knowledge and perception as well as brilliant manipulations of our own expectations. By the novel's end, you will be surprisingly unafraid of hot-air balloons, but you won't be too keen on looking a stranger in the eye.

Ian McEwan is one of Britain's most inventive and important contemporary writers. Also adapted as a film, his novel Enduring Love (1997) is a tale of obsession that has both troubled and enthralled readers around the world. Renowned author Peter Childs explores th! e intricacies of this haunting novel to offer:

  • ! an acces sible introduction to the text and contexts of Enduring Love
  • a critical history, surveying the many interpretations of the text from publication to the present
  • a selection of new and reprinted critical essays on Enduring Love, by Kiernan Ryan, Sean Matthews, Martin Randall, Paul Edwards, Rhiannon Davies and Peter Childs, providing a range of perspectives on the novel and extending the coverage of key critical approaches identified in the survey section
  • cross-references between sections of the guide, in order to suggest links between texts, contexts and criticism
  • suggestions for further reading.

Part of the Routledge Guides to Literature series, this volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of Enduring Love and seeking not only a guide to the novel, but a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds it.

Just when things seem to be looking! up for John and Hannah Bradshaw, their world is turned upside down. Years ago, John was in prison when he was told his first wife, Margaret, died. So how is it that she shows up in Sydney Town looking to pick up where they left off?

Her marriage now null and void, Hannah is distraught. But she and John feel they must separate to allow John's first marriage to continue. But is Margaret hiding something after all? And just what will she do to get what she wants?

This conclusion to the Sydney Cove trilogy will draw readers in with its suspenseful, romantic, and tender narrative.

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Fever Pitch (Full Screen Edition)

  • baseball love comedy
  • love comedy
  • drew arrymore, jimmy fallon
According to Red Sox super-fan Ben Wrightman (Jimmy Fallon), finding romance is about as likely as his beloved team winning the World Series. But when Ben scores a beautiful new girlfriend (Drew Barrymore), suddenly anything is possible. Now the two passions in his life have a chance to go all the way... if he doesn't strike out first.The Farrelly brothers continue their good-natured winning streak with Fever Pitch, a romantic comedy charmed by fate and last-minute improvisation. The movie was originally written with a bittersweet ending, but something unexpected happened (kismet, or perhaps divine intervention?) when the Boston Red Sox scored miraculous victories in the 2004 playoffs and World Series, and Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon were there, in character, to celebrate love and baseball as a pair of ami! able lovers who learn to share their lives while accommodating Fallon's life-long passion for the Red Sox. You really have to love baseball to forgive the formulaic romance by veteran Hollywood screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel (who also wrote A League of Their Own, and could write this stuff in their sleep), but the codirecting Farrellys make it work, along with the easygoing chemistry of Barrymore and Fallon. The movie bears little resemblance to Nick Hornby's source novel (which was more faithfully adapted as a 1997 British comedy starring Colin Firth), but anyone who enjoyed High Fidelity or About a Boy will recognize Hornby's keen understanding of men and women, and the hazards we all endure when playing the game of love. --Jeff ShannonAccording to Red Sox super-fan Ben Wrightman (Jimmy Fallon), finding romance is about as likely as his beloved team winning the World Series. But when Ben scores a beautiful new girlfriend (Drew Bar! rymore), suddenly anything is possible. Now the two passions i! n his li fe have a chance to go all the way... if he doesn't strike out first.The Farrelly brothers continue their good-natured winning streak with Fever Pitch, a romantic comedy charmed by fate and last-minute improvisation. The movie was originally written with a bittersweet ending, but something unexpected happened (kismet, or perhaps divine intervention?) when the Boston Red Sox scored miraculous victories in the 2004 playoffs and World Series, and Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon were there, in character, to celebrate love and baseball as a pair of amiable lovers who learn to share their lives while accommodating Fallon's life-long passion for the Red Sox. You really have to love baseball to forgive the formulaic romance by veteran Hollywood screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel (who also wrote A League of Their Own, and could write this stuff in their sleep), but the codirecting Farrellys make it work, along with the easygoing chemistry of Barrymore and Fall! on. The movie bears little resemblance to Nick Hornby's source novel (which was more faithfully adapted as a 1997 British comedy starring Colin Firth), but anyone who enjoyed High Fidelity or About a Boy will recognize Hornby's keen understanding of men and women, and the hazards we all endure when playing the game of love. --Jeff Shannon

Diamond Select Toys Marvel Select Incredible Hulk Action Figure

  • The Incredible Hulk is one of Marvel Comics' most recognized characters, thanks to appearances in comics, movies and animation
  • Stands 10" tall
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  • Sculpted by Gabriel Marquez
Academy Award® nominee Edward Norton stars as scientist Bruce Banner, a man who has been living in shadows, scouring the planet for an antidote to the unbridled force of rage within him: the Hulk. But when the military masterminds who dream of exploiting his powers force him back to civilization, he finds himself coming face to face with his most formidable foe: the Abomination -â€" a nightmarish beast of pure aggression whose powers match the Hulk’s own!A more accessible and less heavy-handed movie than Ang Lee's 2003 HulkLouis Leterrier's The Incredible Hulk is a purely popcorn! love affair with Marvel's raging, green superhero, as well as the old television series starring Bill Bixby as Dr. David Banner and Lou Ferrigno as the beast within him. Edward Norton takes up where Eric Bana left off in Lee's version, playing Bruce (that's the character's original name) Banner, a haunted scientist always on the move. Trying to eliminate the effects of a military experiment that turns him into the Hulk whenever his emotions get the better of him, Banner is hiding out in Brazil at the film's beginning. Working in a bottling plant and communicating via email with an unidentified professor who thinks he can help, Banner goes postal when General Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross and a small army turn up to grab him. Intent on developing whatever causes Banner's metamorphoses into a weapon, Ross brings along a quietly deranged soldier named Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth), who wants Ross to turn him into a supersoldier who can take on the Hulk. The adventure spreads to the U! .S., where Banner hooks up with his old lover (and Ross' daugh! ter), Be tty (Liv Tyler), and where the Hulk takes on several armed assaults, including one in a pretty unusual location: a college campus. The film's action is impressive, though the computer-generated creature is disappointingly cartoonish, and a second monster turning up late in the movie looks even cheesier. Norton is largely wasted in the film--he's essentially a bridge between sequences where he disappears and the Hulk rampages around. As good an actor as he is, Norton doesn't have the charisma here to carry those scenes in which one waits impatiently for the real show to begin. --Tom Keogh


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The larger-than-life Marvel Super Hero the Hulk explodes onto the big screen! After a freak lab accident unleashes a genetically enhanced, impossibly strong creature, a terrified world must marshal its forces to stop a being with abilities beyond imagination.When the Hulk gets angry, his movie gets good, so you wish he'd get angry more often. Accepting this challenge after the triumphant Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, director Ang Lee has created an ambitious film, based on the Marvel comic created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, that succeeds as a cautionary tale about mad science and traumatized children coping with legaci! es of pain. That's the Hulk's problem: After accidental exposu! re to ga mma radiation, scientist Bruce Banner (Eric Bana) turns into the huge, green, and indestructible Hulk when provoked, and repressed childhood memories fuel his fury. Hobbled by the obligatory "origin story" (to acquaint neophytes with the character's Jekyll-and-Hyde-ish fate), there's room for little else in a sluggish film that struggles to reconcile Lee's stylistic flair (evident in his visual interpretation of comic-book technique) with the razzle-dazzle of a megabudget franchise. What's good is good (Jennifer Connelly essentially echoes her role from A Beautiful Mind, and Nick Nolte is righteously tormented as Banner's father), but the movie's schizoid intentions remain largely unclear. --Jeff ShannonA Diamond Select Release! From the pages of The Incredible Hulk comes this Marvel Select action figure featuring the jade giant himself! This massive 8" behemoth includes fourteen points of articulation and a deluxe rubble base showcasing the aftereffects of a H! ulk-attack! Sculpted by Gabriel Marquez, each rampaging Hulk figure brings a world-shaking mainstay of the Marvel Universe to stores just in time for the big screen sequel! Blister card packaging.

Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers

  • ISBN13: 9780470876411
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!

What was she doing here? Hyattown had changed very little in the years Vanessa Sexton had been away. In some ways her high school sweetheart, Brady Tucker, hadn't changed much eitherâ€"he was still lean, athletic, rugged…But the once reckless boy had become a solid, dependable man. He'd stood her up on the most important night of her life; could she ever trust him again?

So Vanessa had finally come home, Brady thought. She could still turn him inside out with one of her sultry looks. He couldn't believe she hadn't forgiven him for that night twelve years agoâ€"but he'd had his reasons for not showing up. He'd let her leave town thenâ€"but he wasn't going to let her get away this time…

!

What was she doing here? Hyattown had changed very little in the years Vanessa Sexton had been away. In some ways her high school sweetheart, Brady Tucker, hadn't changed much eitherâ€"he was still lean, athletic, rugged…But the once reckless boy had become a solid, dependable man. He'd stood her up on the most important night of her life; could she ever trust him again?

So Vanessa had finally come home, Brady thought. She could still turn him inside out with one of her sultry looks. He couldn't believe she hadn't forgiven him for that night twelve years agoâ€"but he'd had his reasons for not showing up. He'd let her leave town thenâ€"but he wasn't going to let her get away this time…

A brand new collection of state-of-the-art insights into business innovation and design strategy from world-renowned experts--now in a convenient e-format, at a great price!

3 extraordinary eBooks help you drive maximum value from business innovation! , design, and creativity!

Three remarkable eBooks t! ake you to the cutting edge of business innovation, design strategy, and value creation! Predictable Magic: Unleash the Power of Design Strategy to Transform Your Business introduces a breakthrough process for crafting rewarding, empowering customer experiences that create deep emotional connections with your products, services, and brands. Do You Matter?: How Great Design Will Make People Love Your Company shows how to build a truly design-driven company: one that can consistently create designs that drive sustainable business performance improvements. Finally, in Disrupt: Think the Unthinkable to Spark Transformation in Your Business, frog design's Luke Williams integrates powerful creativity techniques with business discipline in a five-step program for identifying disruptive opportunities--and successfully executing on them!

From world-renowned leaders in business innovation and design, including Ravi Sawhney, Deepa Prahalad, Rober! t Brunner, Stewart Emery, and Luke Williams.

A brand new collection of state-of-the-art insights into business innovation and design strategy from world-renowned experts--now in a convenient e-format, at a great price!

3 extraordinary eBooks help you drive maximum value from business innovation, design, and creativity!

Three remarkable eBooks take you to the cutting edge of business innovation, design strategy, and value creation! Predictable Magic: Unleash the Power of Design Strategy to Transform Your Business introduces a breakthrough process for crafting rewarding, empowering customer experiences that create deep emotional connections with your products, services, and brands. Do You Matter?: How Great Design Will Make People Love Your Company shows how to build a truly design-driven company: one that can consistently create designs that drive sustainable business performance improvements. Final! ly, in Disrupt: Think the Unthinkable to Spark Transformati! on in Yo ur Business, frog design's Luke Williams integrates powerful creativity techniques with business discipline in a five-step program for identifying disruptive opportunities--and successfully executing on them!

From world-renowned leaders in business innovation and design, including Ravi Sawhney, Deepa Prahalad, Robert Brunner, Stewart Emery, and Luke Williams.

“Hess and Goetz present a roadmap for how to avoid the things that can cause you to stumble and how to build a business the right way.”

â€"JEFF ZEIGLER, CEO, TechTurn.com, Austin, TX

 

“When I started my graphic design business, I knew I had enough talent to impress and keep my clients, but I struggled with the day to day running of the business. So, You Want To Start A Business? is the blueprint I needed to get org! anized and put all the right things in place.”

â€"KORY BAILEY, Owner, Creative Counterpart

 

Build the Successful Company You’ve Always Wanted to Own!

  • Avoid the 8 disastrous operational mistakes that kill new businesses
  • Walk step-by-step through the entire process of building a winning business
  • Master 55 amazingly simple rules of business success
  • For every entrepreneur and potential entrepreneur...no previous business experience necessary!
  • Launch the winning business you’ve always wanted…or make more money in the business you’ve already started!

More than 5,000,000 new businesses are started each year…but 70% of them will fail. Now, two renowned experts on entrepreneurship identify the 8 “killer mistakes” that cause most business failuresâ€"and give you the knowledge, tools, a! nd hands-on advice to avoid them, so you can build a business ! that thrives.

 

Unlike other books on entrepreneurship, this book focuses on the crucial operational issues associated with consistent profitability. You’ll learn how to identify the right opportunities and customers; design winning products and services; set the right prices; overcome customer inertia; avoid common day-to-day management mistakes; find and keep good employees; and finally, smoothly manage growth.

 

Throughout, the authors draw on real life entrepreneurial experiences, case studies, and leading-edge research. There’s nothing theoretical here: This is fast-paced, 100% practical advice you can use to make your business dreams and goals come trueâ€"starting right now.

 

What really makes a successful entrepreneur?

What they do, how they act...and how to ! find your best path to business success

 

Get the 3 “Ws” right from the start

What will you sell, who will buy itâ€"and why will they buy it?

 

55 simple, indispensable rules for success

What you must know about customers, competitors, and your employees

 

The art and science of managing people, operations, and growth

Create processes, set priorities, maximize quality, measure peopleâ€"and improve every day

Organization = productivity = success and confidence. Introducing “Stay Organized and Get Things Done: The Sock Puppet School of Business” â€" the Vook that explains step-by-step how to get and stay organized once and for all. This is not your typical stuffy business g! uide; prepare to laugh and learn. Download it now!

With ! this Voo k, you’ll learn proven strategies for establishing and maintaining organization in your life, from determining your current level of organization to managing your belongings and accounts. First you’ll learn how to conquer your greatest adversaries: clutter and procrastination. Then you’ll learn how to formulate a plan to implement your organizational techniques, how to re-wire your thought patterns to approach situations more efficiently, and how to establish a list of tasks. Finally, you’ll explore ways to manage task follow through, use technology in order to increase organization, and discover solutions for managing all of your office’s paper. Tips, case studies and lighthearted video demonstrations featuring sock puppets provide humor and added dimension to this one-of-a-kind guide.

Organization = productivity = success and confidence. Introducing “Stay Organized and Get Things Done: The Sock Puppet School of Business” â€" the Vook that explains step-! by-step how to get and stay organized once and for all. This is not your typical stuffy business guide; prepare to laugh and learn. Download it now!

With this Vook, you’ll learn proven strategies for establishing and maintaining organization in your life, from determining your current level of organization to managing your belongings and accounts. First you’ll learn how to conquer your greatest adversaries: clutter and procrastination. Then you’ll learn how to formulate a plan to implement your organizational techniques, how to re-wire your thought patterns to approach situations more efficiently, and how to establish a list of tasks. Finally, you’ll explore ways to manage task follow through, use technology in order to increase organization, and discover solutions for managing all of your office’s paper. Tips, case studies and lighthearted video demonstrations featuring sock puppets provide humor and added dimension to this one-of-a-kind guide.

Busine! ss Model Generation is a handbook for visionaries, game ch! angers, and challengers striving to defy outmoded business models and design tomorrow's enterprises. If your organization needs to adapt to harsh new realities, but you don't yet have a strategy that will get you out in front of your competitors, you need Business Model Generation.

Co-created by 470 "Business Model Canvas" practitioners from 45 countries, the book features a beautiful, highly visual, 4-color design that takes powerful strategic ideas and tools, and makes them easy to implement in your organization. It explains the most common Business Model patterns, based on concepts from leading business thinkers, and helps you reinterpret them for your own context. You will learn how to systematically understand, design, and implement a game-changing business model--or analyze and renovate an old one. Along the way, you'll understand at a much deeper level your customers, distribution channels, partners, revenue streams, costs, and your core value proposition. !

Business Model Generation features practical innovation techniques used today by leading consultants and companies worldwide, including 3M, Ericsson, Capgemini, Deloitte, and others. Designed for doers, it is for those ready to abandon outmoded thinking and embrace new models of value creation: for executives, consultants, entrepreneurs, and leaders of all organizations. If you're ready to change the rules, you belong to "the business model generation!"

Business Model Generation is a handbook for visionaries, game changers, and challengers striving to defy outmoded business models and design tomorrow's enterprises. If your organization needs to adapt to harsh new realities, but you don't yet have a strategy that will get you out in front of your competitors, you need Business Model Generation.

Co-created by 470 "Business Model Canvas" practitioners from 45 countries, the book features a beautiful, highly visual, 4-color design ! that takes powerful strategic ideas and tools, and makes them ! easy to implement in your organization. It explains the most common Business Model patterns, based on concepts from leading business thinkers, and helps you reinterpret them for your own context. You will learn how to systematically understand, design, and implement a game-changing business model--or analyze and renovate an old one. Along the way, you'll understand at a much deeper level your customers, distribution channels, partners, revenue streams, costs, and your core value proposition.

Business Model Generation features practical innovation techniques used today by leading consultants and companies worldwide, including 3M, Ericsson, Capgemini, Deloitte, and others. Designed for doers, it is for those ready to abandon outmoded thinking and embrace new models of value creation: for executives, consultants, entrepreneurs, and leaders of all organizations. If you're ready to change the rules, you belong to "the business model generation!"

The Power of “What If” Questions
Content from authors Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur

We often have trouble conceiving innovative business models because we are held back in our thinking by status quo. The status quo stifles imagination. One way to overcome this problem is to challenge conventional assumptions with “what if” questions. With the right business model ingredients, what we think of as impossible might just be doable. “What if” questions help us break free of constraints imposed by current business models. They should provoke us and challenge our thinking. They should disturb us as intriguing, difficult-to-execute propositions.

What if...!
…furniture buyers picked up components in flat pack! form fr om a large warehouse and assembled the products themselves in their homes? What is common practice today was unthinkable until IKEA introduced the concept in the 1960’s.

…airlines didn’t buy engines for their airplanes, but paid for every hour an engine runs? That is how Rolls-Royce transformed itself from a money-losing British manufacturer into a service firm that today is the world’s second biggest provider of large jet engines.

…voice calls were free worldwide? In 2003 Skype launched a service that allowed free voice calling via the internet. After five years, Skype had acquired 400 million registered users who collectively had made 100 billion free phone calls.


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Sunday, November 6, 2011

The Best Laid Plans: A Novel

  • ISBN13: 9780345491190
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
Selected as the 2011 CBC Canada Reads Winner!

This book beat out work by Douglas Coupland and Will Ferguson because it is very, very good â€" a terrific Canadian political satire.

Here’s the set up: A burnt-out politcal aide quits just before an election â€" but is forced to run a hopeless campaign on the way out. He makes a deal with a crusty old Scot, Angus McLintock â€" an engineering professor who will do anything, anything, to avoid teaching English to engineers â€" to let his name stand in the election. No need to campaign, certain to lose, and so on.

Then a great scandal blows away his opponent, and to their horror, Angus is elected. He decides to see what go! od an honest M.P. who doesn’t care about being re-elected can do in Parliament. The results are hilarious â€" and with chess, a hovercraft, and the love of a good woman thrown in, this very funny book has something for everyone.Selected as the 2011 CBC Canada Reads Winner!

This book beat out work by Douglas Coupland and Will Ferguson because it is very, very good â€" a terrific Canadian political satire.

Here’s the set up: A burnt-out politcal aide quits just before an election â€" but is forced to run a hopeless campaign on the way out. He makes a deal with a crusty old Scot, Angus McLintock â€" an engineering professor who will do anything, anything, to avoid teaching English to engineers â€" to let his name stand in the election. No need to campaign, certain to lose, and so on.

Then a great scandal blows away his opponent, and to their horror, Angus is elected. He decides to see what good an honest M.P. who doesn’t car! e about being re-elected can do in Parliament. The results are! hilario us â€" and with chess, a hovercraft, and the love of a good woman thrown in, this very funny book has something for everyone.


From the Trade Paperback edition.Selected as the 2011 CBC Canada Reads Winner!

This book beat out work by Douglas Coupland and Will Ferguson because it is very, very good â€" a terrific Canadian political satire.

Here’s the set up: A burnt-out politcal aide quits just before an election â€" but is forced to run a hopeless campaign on the way out. He makes a deal with a crusty old Scot, Angus McLintock â€" an engineering professor who will do anything, anything, to avoid teaching English to engineers â€" to let his name stand in the election. No need to campaign, certain to lose, and so on.

Then a great scandal blows away his opponent, and to their horror, Angus is elected. He decides to see what good an honest M.P. who doesn’t care about being re-elected can do in Parliament. The results a! re hilarious â€" and with chess, a hovercraft, and the love of a good woman thrown in, this very funny book has something for everyone.


From the Trade Paperback edition.From Lynn Schnurnberger, bestselling co-author of Mine Are Spectacular! and The Botox Diaries, comes a novel of big secrets, family ties, and a reminder that sometimes The Best Laid Plans can lead to delightful surprises.

Tru Newman is one of the Upper East Side “M&Ms”â€"the wealthy stay-at-home moms who are into personal Maintenance and Mothering. Having been raised by a beauty queen mother who constantly picked on her, Tru loves looking after her investment banker husband, Peter, and their twin teen daughters. But her perfect world spins off its axis the night Tru throws a charity benefit and discovers that Peter’s been out of work for three months. Even worse, the family’s been living on a house of cardsâ€"specifically, Visa and Amexâ€"that’s about t! o collapse.

Suze Orman tells Tru to “Get a job!” B! ut doing what? When Tru’s best friend, Sienna Post, loses her position as an anchor on the local nightly news, the two hatch a profitable if illegal plan: They’ll open an escort service with “working girls” all over the age of forty. Modeling themselves on Carla Bruni (“after she married the president of France, not before, when she was dating Mick Jagger”), their smart, sexy, seasoned escorts become a big hit with a roster of thirty-year-old clients.

If only Tru’s legit life could fall so easily into place: Her husband’s new job has him working side by side with a flirtatious neighbor, her fourteen-year-old twins are competing over a two-timing, Clearasil-using Casanova, and after suffering a heart attack in her bodybuilding class, Tru’s hypercritical mother moves in with her. Not to mention that the gossip columns get wind that Tru and Sienna’s “temp agency” isn’t on the up-and-upâ€"and the DA is on their case. 

But for the savvy and spir! ited Tru, these new obstacles bring unexpected benefitsâ€"from Geisha facials, to massage toys that are “better than chocolate,” to the realization that at midlife, she’s more comfortable than ever before in her own skin and more grateful for all that she has. By turns touching and laugh-out-loud funny, this is a must-read for every woman who knows it’s never too late to make a fresh start.

Cold Creek Manor

  • Finally putting an end to their days as slaves to the hustle-and-bustle of city life, Gothamites Cooper Tilson (Dennis Quaid) and his wife, Leah (Sharon Stone), pack up their kids and all their possessions and move into a recently repossessed mansion in the sticks of New York State. Once grand and elegant, the Cold Creek Manor is now a shambles, but Cooper and Leah have plenty of time to renovate.
COLD CREEK MANOR is a heart-pounding thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat in tension-filled suspense. Wanting to escape city life for the saner, safer countryside, New Yorkers Cooper Tilson (Dennis Quaid), his wife Leah (1995 Golden Globe winner Sharon Stone, Best Actress, CASINO), and their two children move into a dilapidated old mansion still filled with the possessions of the previous family. Turning it into their dream house soon becomes a living nightmare when the previous owne! r (Stephen Dorff) shows up, and a series of terrifying incidents lead them on a spine-tingling search for clues to the estate's dark and lurid past.Turn off your brain and Cold Creek Manor just might turn into an entertaining thriller. Taking an uncharacteristic detour into nonsensical plot mechanics, director Mike Figgis expertly pushes buttons with this nerve-jangling but ultimately hackneyed story (by Richard Jeffries) about a documentary filmmaker (Dennis Quaid) who moves his wife (Sharon Stone) and two kids into a run-down rural mansion once owned by the family of a simmering ex-convict (Stephen Dorff), who's got secret reasons for wanting Quaid's family to leave. This rote potboiler wants to be as thrilling as Fatal Attraction, but it's more like Pacific Heights--fun to watch as the tension escalates with Dorff's violent behavior, but seriously flawed as plot holes proliferate. With a few good shocks and slinky support from Juliette Lewis, it's pe! rfectly enjoyable as a popcorn distraction, but maybe they sho! uld've c alled it Cold Creaky Manor instead. --Jeff Shannon

1022 Evergreen Place (Cedar Cove)

  • ISBN13: 9780778328063
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
The people of Cedar Cove know how to celebrate Christmas. Like Grace and Olivia and everyone else, Beth Morehouse expects this Christmas to be one of her best. Her small Christmas-tree farm is prospering, her daughters and her dogs are happy and well, and her new relationship with local vet Ted Reynolds is showing plenty of romantic promise.

But…someone recently left a basket filled with puppies on her doorstep, puppies she's determined to place in good homes. That's complication number one. And number two is that her daughters Bailey and Sophie have invited their dad, Beth's ex-husband, Kent, to Cedar Cove for Christmas. The girls have visions of a mom-and-dad reunion dancing in thei! r heads.

As always in lifeâ€"and in Cedar Coveâ€"there are surprises, too. More than one family's going to have a puppy under the tree. More than one scheme will go awry. And more than one romance will have a happy ending!Dear Reader,

You've probably heard that my wife has left me. Rachel's pregnant, and she says she can't handle the stress in our household anymore. My thirteen-year-old daughter, Jolene, is jealous of her. Maybe it's my fault. As a widower I spoiled herâ€"

Jolene was reading over my shoulder just now and says that's not true. She claims Rachel ruined everything. But that's not true. The real question is: How can I get my wife back? I don't even know where she is. She's not with Teri Polgar or any of her other friends from the salon. The other question is…when will Jolene grow up and stop acting like such a brat?

Of course, I'm not the only one in town with problems. Linc Wyse's father-in-law is trying to destroy his business. And you! know Charlotte Rhodes? Seems she's becoming forgetful, and th! e family 's worried about her and Ben. Lots of other stuff going onâ€"but Rachel is better at keeping up with it than I am.

If you have any idea where my wife is, give me a call. Please.

Bruce PeytonCelebrity Chef Kathleen Wilson has returned to Whispering Cover for her high school reunion. Tired of big city life, she is looking forward to relaxing in the quaint fishing village, but the one thing she’s not looking forward to is facing the boy from her past. The boy she turned her back on ten years ago. The same boy she has never quite gotten over.

Firefighter Trent Parker has never given up on reuniting with his Katy, and when he hears she’s back in town, he believes a blatant seduction is just the thing to show her where she belongs. Sparks fly the second they see one another and when he accidentally soaks her with his fire hose it generates heat and need inside them both with only one way to extinguish those fiery flames.

Soon they are burning up the! sheets but when morning comes and the smoke clears, one question remains. Will Katy leave for another ten years, or will she realize the fire they've ignited isn't about to burn out?Celebrity Chef Kathleen Wilson has returned to Whispering Cover for her high school reunion. Tired of big city life, she is looking forward to relaxing in the quaint fishing village, but the one thing she’s not looking forward to is facing the boy from her past. The boy she turned her back on ten years ago. The same boy she has never quite gotten over.

Firefighter Trent Parker has never given up on reuniting with his Katy, and when he hears she’s back in town, he believes a blatant seduction is just the thing to show her where she belongs. Sparks fly the second they see one another and when he accidentally soaks her with his fire hose it generates heat and need inside them both with only one way to extinguish those fiery flames.

Soon they are burning up the sheets bu! t when morning comes and the smoke clears, one question remain! s. Will Katy leave for another ten years, or will she realize the fire they've ignited isn't about to burn out?Sometimes the best diagnosis calls for a visit home, an unexpected reunion, and a sexual adventure.

Danica Kent, MD has settled into her new role as a small town doctor. She caters to her Whispering Cove patients, especially the rum drinking, poker playing, town grandfathers who have their hands in a bit of everything. But when one of those patients brings her face-to-face with her high school crush the work she’s done to reinvent herself falters.

Braydon Mitchell lives his life sailing around the world to write freelance magazine articles. He has no desire to settle down with a family in a small town, so he’s successfully avoided his grandfather’s pleas...until now. Returning home out of worry for his grandfather’s health, Braydon finds more than old friends in town for their high school reunion. His grandfather’s sexy doctor.

W! ith erotic sparks igniting at their first touch, Danica makes Braydon want everything he isn’t built for...small town stability, a strong woman’s love, family. Can they find a common ground in love?
Sometimes the best diagnosis calls for a visit home, an unexpected reunion, and a sexual adventure.

Danica Kent, MD has settled into her new role as a small town doctor. She caters to her Whispering Cove patients, especially the rum drinking, poker playing, town grandfathers who have their hands in a bit of everything. But when one of those patients brings her face-to-face with her high school crush the work she’s done to reinvent herself falters.

Braydon Mitchell lives his life sailing around the world to write freelance magazine articles. He has no desire to settle down with a family in a small town, so he’s successfully avoided his grandfather’s pleas...until now. Returning home out of worry for his grandfather’s health, Braydon finds m! ore than old friends in town for their high school reunion. Hi! s grandf ather’s sexy doctor.

With erotic sparks igniting at their first touch, Danica makes Braydon want everything he isn’t built for...small town stability, a strong woman’s love, family. Can they find a common ground in love?
Haunting memories made her run--family forced her return--can love make her stay?


Ten years ago a tragic accident forced Andrea “Andie” Adair from Whispering Cove, leaving behind her family, friends, and fiancé. A dark secret keeps her away from the sleepy seaport village, until she receives an ambiguous telephone from her grandfather. He’s in the hospital. Desperate to cling to her only living relative she races back home and straight into the arms of the one man she can’t bear to face.

Sheriff, Brody McGrath, built his life without the woman of his dreams, but when he catches Andie, thinking she’s a prowler, he isn’t prepared for the onslaught of emotionsâ€"grief, regret, heartache, and love. !

There is no denying the old spark between them still burns brightly, but can love defeat the demons of Andie’s past and allow her to live again?
Haunting memories made her run--family forced her return--can love make her stay?


Ten years ago a tragic accident forced Andrea “Andie” Adair from Whispering Cove, leaving behind her family, friends, and fiancé. A dark secret keeps her away from the sleepy seaport village, until she receives an ambiguous telephone from her grandfather. He’s in the hospital. Desperate to cling to her only living relative she races back home and straight into the arms of the one man she can’t bear to face.

Sheriff, Brody McGrath, built his life without the woman of his dreams, but when he catches Andie, thinking she’s a prowler, he isn’t prepared for the onslaught of emotionsâ€"grief, regret, heartache, and love.

There is no denying the old spark between them still burns brightly, but can love! defeat the demons of Andie’s past and allow her to live aga! in?
< p>Surrounded by potential enemies, Hannah McGarry faces the mystery of her husband's suspicious death, the prospect of bankruptcy ... and the disappearance of the fabulous Black Trinity necklace that was to be her financial security. Desperate, she calls Archer Donovan, a silent partner in Pearl Cove, her late husband's pearl farm venture. He might help her ... if the price is right.

Setting: Contemporary Seattle, Washington, and Pearl Cove, Australia
Sensuality: 8

The eldest brother in one of Seattle's most powerful families, Archer Donovan is handsome, dangerous, and fascinated by pearls. He's also been in love with Hannah McGarry, his half-brother's wife, for the last 10 years. Far away in Australia, Hannah's loveless marriage ends in violence when a cyclone tears apart her pearl farm and her husband, Len, dies. But Len's death wasn't an accident; he was murdered. Desperate for help, Hannah places a call to Archer, who rushes to her side and quickly find! s that powerful competitors in the pearl trade are circling Pearl Cove like buzzards.

Businessmen, criminals, and government agencies are willing to do whatever it takes to find a fabulous pearl necklace, named the Black Trinity, and to learn Len's secret formula for producing the extraordinary black pearls. Racing against time and tracked by enemies too numerous to count, Archer and Hannah begin a dangerous game of hide and seek to find Len's murderer and recover the Black Trinity. But even if the two lovers survive their adventure, will Archer find a way to convince Hannah that he's a different man from his unbalanced half-brother? And can Hannah find the courage to chance her heart and love again?

Readers who have waited impatiently for this third book about the Donovan family won't be disappointed. Lowell combines her trademark sophisticated suspense and sexual intensity with a plot rich in the fascinating lore of cultured pearls and full of Austral! ian atmosphere and the sights and sounds of Seattle. --Loi! s Faye D yerDear Reader,

Guess what? I'm falling in love! With Mack McAfee.

My baby daughter, Noelle, and I have been living next door to Mack since the spring. I'm still a little wary about our relationship, because I haven't always made good decisions when it comes to men. My baby's father, David Rhodes, is testament to that. I'm so worried he might sue for custody.

In the meantime, the World War II letters I found are a wonderful distraction. Both Mack and I are trying to learn what happened to the soldier who wrote them and the woman he loved.

Come by sometime for a glass of iced tea and I'll show you the letters. Plus I'll tell you the latest about Grace and Olivia, my brother Linc and his wife, Lori (who tied the knot about five minutes after they met!), and all our other mutual friends. Oh, and maybe Mack can join us….

Mary Jo Wyse

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