Rediscover the joy of reading with heartwarming tales designed just for you.

Step into a world of nostalgia, laughter, and inspiration with Feel-Better Short Stories for Seniors, a collection meticulously crafted by Bradley Windrow to reignite the sparks of joy and comfort for senior readers. Each of the 40 bite-sized stories is a little slice of fun, ready to lift your spirits and tickle your funny bone. Written in large print for easy reading, these tales are just the right length for a quick pick-me-up without tiring out your eyes.

From bumping into a long-lost friend at the supermarket to the comical chaos of a community bingo night, every tale is a mini-vacation, a great way to add a little light-hearted fun to the day. Feel-Better Short Stories for Seniors promises to make you laugh, cry, and "aww" with its relatable characters and uplifting messages.

What's Inside:

• Follow along with tales that capture the essence of cherished memories and simpler times.
• Feel uplifted and encouraged by stories that celebrate resilience, kindness, and the human spirit.
• Enjoy a good laugh with humorous stories that warm the heart and brighten the day.
• Embark on adventures and thoughtful reflections that resonate deeply and meaningfully.

Feel-Better Short Stories for Seniors is a wonderful gift for parents, grandparents, and anyone who loves a good story. Share the gift of joy and comfort with this delightful collection, perfect for bringing a smile to the faces of those you love.

So, grab a cup of tea, find a comfy chair, and settle in with your copy of Feel-Better ShortStories for Seniors today. Experience the uplifting power of heartwarming stories!

Manila, Philippines, 2003. Dane Chandler is visiting Manila on a writing assignment. Jack Pierce is a tough-talking Korean War veteran. When Jack asks Dane to join him for cards at the pension's cafe, Dane instinctively agrees, sensing the man's "command" presence. What unfolds will change their lives forever.

Tokyo, Japan, 1949. Jack Pierce joined the army for honor and adventure, finding himself garrisoned at Camp Drake, Tokyo. On a raucous night at Ginza's glitzy Club Florida, the young corporal meets the love of his life, Michiko Okura. After a touchy start, the two embark on a journey of love and discovery. But when the Korean War erupts, Jack ships out to a brutal landscape of violence and is not the same when he returns.

As Dane listens to Jack's story, experiencing his hellish battlefield encounters and tremendous loss, he witnesses Jack's undaunted outlook on life and discovers newfound maturity in himself.

A searing, hard-boiled account of camaraderie among soldiers, multi-cultural love, and heartbreak set against the colorful backdrop of post-war Japan and the horrific battle for "Rat Mountain," Cherry Blossoms in Winter is a wild rollercoaster, making one laugh, cry, cheer, and relish the power of the human spirit.

“In Like Family, Feeney not only brings us back to the terrifying time when the Spanish flu had its hold on us, but also beautifully explores the meaning of family.” –Ann Hood, author of The Stolen Child

Mollie Crowley, a 26-year-old Irish unmarried teacher at a one-room schoolhouse in rural Michigan, and 8-year-old Cecilia Pokorski, a Polish girl orphaned after the deaths of her family during the 1918 influenza pandemic, are an unlikely pair.

While Cecilia is grieving the loss of her beloved Mamusia, Mollie leans on her own mother, Catherine, for assistance after taking the girl into their home. Mollie loves teaching, but Cecilia hated having Mollie as her first teacher.

In their town in rural Michigan, the Irish and the Polish don't mix. The Catholic Church, the town's doctor, and Mollie's older brothers are pitted against Mollie, who is highly independent, even stubborn. Everyone who fears "the sickness" is desperate to stay safe and healthy, and unsure of what precautions work.

Cecilia is treated with suspicion, even fear. Mollie, Cecilia, and Catherine, while isolated on their family farm, face all these struggles with courage and creativity.

Readers will see challenges they faced during COVID-19 as similar to the ones people faced nearly a hundred years earlier. Like Family explores themes of prejudice related to ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and religion; foster care and adoption; feminism; education and teaching; language and cultural differences; family factions; death and grief; loneliness; and ultimately, the power of love, family (biological and intentional), and community.

2020 PenCraft Award Winner - Adventure Fiction

"...covers more ground and cultural range than most such tales, but retains a classic feel and a solid heart." –IndieReader

Creators of the World, Coyote and the Moon pay special attention to the only survivor of a blazing fire, Tali Nohkati, as the child takes his first steps. At the end of a long journey rich in animal encounters that takes him from the White Land to the Land of the Red Earth, Tali is finally adopted by a tribe.

After saving Nuttah from the sacrifice of the Morning Star, Tali seeks refuge in the mangrove close to Hitchiti the Alligator and Raven the Raven where Cagama the Turtle advises them to go to sea. In the heavenly light of the island of Cagama, they taste the true happiness of starting a family and of living in harmony with a tribe. However, all hell breaks loose as Huracan is unleashed, its violent winds destroying their piece of paradise and taking everything in their path, men and destinies alike...

Set in modern-day Tokyo, The Butterfly Café tells the story of American Jessie Yamada. When her emotionally-abusive husband suddenly dies in a traffic accident, she is overcome with guilt because while making plans to leave him, she had often thought how much easier it would be for her if he were dead. Those feelings quickly shift to shock and anger after discovering her entire marriage had been built upon secrets and lies. Jessie unexpectedly inherits a dilapidated café full of cats, where with the help of old friends and quirky neighbors, she constructs a new life for herself and her daughter. But just when things finally seem to be going right, a twist of fate forces her to make a decision that will have a far-reaching impact on herself and all the people she loves.

The Butterfly Café explores issues such as friendship, family, and love. It shows how second chances at happiness can be found in unexpected ways.

"DeConna leaves it to the reader to ponder whether the value of truth always outweighs its cost." –Carolyn Geduld, author of The Struggle

Jenny Smith, a young journalist, secures a career-making interview with a famous but reclusive author, AJ Kenton. Jenny's time with Mr. Kenton, however, is not spent in her asking questions but in his telling one last story.

During three afternoons, Kenton describes a pivotal point in his life. As a twelve year old, he went door to door in his neighborhood and sold packets of flower seeds. His goal was to earn a prize from the seed company's catalog. His memories reveal the hidden struggles of middle-class life in the early 1960s, a time that many people living today picture as ideal. When neighbors invite AJ into their homes, they also invite him into their private worlds of successes, failures, and dreams. At the same time, AJ discovers his true talents, and he faces the dysfunction that may tear his family apart.

By experiencing an intimate look at a cross-section of American life from the past, Jenny realizes how our present American life is painfully similar. Ultimately, she must decide whether to unmask harsh realities or to maintain pleasant illusions.

Madeleine and Jane, both in their early twenties, arrive separately in Manhattan in January 1968.

Jane is an aspiring writer seeking adventure, Madeleine, a fragile young woman fleeing an erotic nightmare. They meet by chance and throw in as roommates, first in an East Village tenement and later, through a stroke of dubious luck, in the luxurious uptown apartment of a mysteriously absent woman. Together and apart, Madeleine and Jane encounter the terrors and excitements—muggings, drugs, sexual freedom and experimentation—that burgeoned in the New York of that era. As the two develop a wary friendship, a self-appointed therapist—one of those Nietzschean characters who sprang up like mushrooms in the soil of the sixties—becomes entangled in their lives and, ultimately, divides them.

In 1968, two revolutions were in progress, one political and the other sexual. Neither Madeleine nor Jane has much interest in the protests on the Columbia University campus, but both are caught up in the maelstrom of erotic energy swirling through the country and the world in those heady days. Jane survives a rough initiation into the realities of sex, but in the course of this adventure she makes a moral error that she will regret for the rest of her life. Nevertheless, Jane comes through her New York initiation with her future intact. Madeleine does not.

Sometimes it seems that the sixties never ended, but it was a different time—raw, dismaying, exhilarating. Madeleine and Jane brings it back.

"Funny as hell, brilliant dialogue, great characters who I just want to hang with forever and an air-tight story-line that thinks of every contingency and plans accordingly." –Tom McCaffrey, bestselling author of The Claire Trilogy

What sucks about waking up next to a dead girl on a Saturday is, more than likely you're gonna miss brunch.

Just ask Sammy Junior-full-time house painter, part-time street artist and, as of Saturday morning, prime suspect in a South Tampa homicide investigation. One more hassle he simply does not need.

Then there's Penny Sullivan, a fifteen-year-old runaway who shows up in South Tampa that same Saturday morning with only her dead sister's street smarts, a whole lot of survivor's guilt, and a Canada backpack.

Misunderstandings lead to Penny joining Sammy's crew, giving her a glimpse of the house painting business-where mind-numbing boredom inspires an acid-trip world of distraction, art and healing relationships.

A funny, fast-paced story about friendship and love, tragedy and redemption, and the always intriguing business of house painting.

Love a good adventure story-one with sweet old dogs and flawed, yet lovable humans? Hate the idea of factory farming and animal abuse? If so, you're gonna love Clucked! Clucked takes the reader, its bereaved Spam-loving protagonist, and one elderly rat terrier on a wild voyage from Corpus Christi Bay to the Sea Islands.

What do you do when you have nothing left to lose? You say goodbye to everything and everyone you'd ever known, pack up your worldly belongings (and an old half-blind dog), cast off your lines and set sail in your tiny sailboat to anywhere else.

Two years ago, Matt lost his wife to an asleep-at-the-wheel truck driver for the corrupt Clawson Chicken Corporation, and most of his savings to a court battle with the aforementioned fowl magnate. Trusting that the ocean will heal his battered psyche, Matt heads out from Corpus Christi Bay in a vintage sloop, trying to out sail bad memories and find a path forward.

As he winds his way east beyond the Gulf, he has adventures (and misadventures), meets a quirky cast of characters, and is dogged at every turn by reminders of the reach of the greedy chicken king, Colonel Clyde Clawson. A close encounter with a coral reef nearly wrecks his boat, a mishap that draws him away from his loosely-charted journey, up the intracoastal waterway, to Bullfrog's Boatyard, and ultimately into the heart of Gullah Geechee country.

Here, Matt meets a beguiling linguistic anthropologist and learns the terrible truth about the Colonel, his secret lab, and his cannibalistic coterie (the Circle of Tantalus). With environmental abuse running rampant and factory farming taking on a whole new meaning, it will be up to Matt and friends, both old and new, to bring down the greedy Clawson corporation, find justice for its victims and along the way, save a musical dog, and a whole bunch of chickens.

Rachel and Talia Fontenot are sisters born into brutal, rural poverty of southeastern Louisiana in the 1960s.

Raised with one another until tragic circumstances intervene and they are separated. Talia disappearing into a life of drugs and petty crime, Rachel fleeing to New Orleans. It is now present day and Talia has been missing for many years. Rachel in New Orleans is living what appears to be the perfect life, but underneath she is struggling with constant anxiety, prescription drug abuse and tremendous grief over the loss of her missing sister, as well as her oldest son to an accident several years earlier.

One night, she receives a call from a nurse she's not heard from since Hurricane Katrina. The information she is given sets in motion a series of events that will unravel. Rachel's life forced her to examine her past choices and takes her on a psychologically arduous journey to save her sister.

"Dwyer's experiences as a West Point graduate, Army spouse, and mother of two combat Veterans shines through in her authentic and empathetic portrayal of military life. Highly recommended." –Bob Mayer, NYT bestselling author, West Point graduate and former Green Beret

2003. The War on Terror rocks the world, but Kelly McGowan dreams only of the exciting adventures ahead with her fiancé Matt, a new Army lieutenant from West Point.

When Matt deploys to Iraq, reality hits. Kelly, coping with her loneliness, questions if their love will endure. Matt returns from war aloof and sullen, forcing Kelly to deal with her emotions - and a secret from his past that could destroy their future. She seeks solace at her aunt's beach house, only to be walloped by a catastrophic hurricane.

The Roof Above is the story of a young woman's journey through war, storms, and secrets to find her tribe and the love she deserves.

Once blessed with everything he thought he ever wanted, Sid Carver finds himself on the verge of collapse. A string of reckless decisions has left him without a family, without a career, without an identity.

The dark clouds seem to part the day a woman named Holly Tithe moves into the apartment across the hall. He sees her as a “puzzle with missing pieces.” She sees him as a “broken toy” in need of mending. He cannot grasp her cosmic views on the nature of human existence. She cannot fathom why he keeps an enormous python and a pair of vicious lizards caged in his living room. Despite their differences, their lives quickly intertwine.

Just as Sid finds a possible route toward redemption, new obstacles block his path. One of them is a Neanderthal-like brute who seems to have won Holly's affection. As Sid's darkest impulses take hold, he must decide which role he wants to play in the life he has left—predator or prey.

From the author of Managed Care, the Maxy Book Awards 2019 "Book of the Year"

“Joe Barrett's Daisy in the Doghouse is serious about America’s social ills, yet it wraps its message in a dark, yet witty send-up of the digital age.” –IndieReader

What happens when an ex-CEO, frustrated with the corruption in the American financial system, hijacks his twelve-year-old daughter’s blog to try and change things from the bottom up?

In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, Jack Sullivan, former CEO and current stay-at-home dad, struggles to find an outlet for his frustrations with the unfair financial systems of corporate America. Meanwhile, Daisy, his precocious twelve-year-old daughter, has recently garnered a substantial following for her new blog, documenting surreptitious “social experiments” performed on her unaware family. When Daisy’s blogging activities are outed, Jack decides to leverage his daughter’s popularity with American youth to communicate the greed and hypocrisy inherent in the corporate professions of many parents. Inspired by her father’s rants, the popularity of Daisy’s blog soars, resulting in an unlikely sequence of events that ultimately has a very positive impact on way that people treat each other in American society.

For fans of Maria Semple’s Where’d You Go Bernadette or Camille Pagan’s I’m Fine and Neither Are You, comes the perfect laugh-out-loud dramedy AND THEN THERE'S MARGARET about marriage, midlife and a controlling, manipulative and self-absorbed mother-in-law thrown into the mix. MULTI-AWARD-WINNING debut novel, AND THEN THERE'S MARGARET, takes readers on a relatable and hilarious ride, as Allie realizes the only way to survive the angst of family is to let go….and let be.

"Perfect for women’s fiction books club wanting to explore complex and turbulent family relationships. It’s a playful coming of (middle-age) novel.” –IndieReader

When Allison Montgomery's beloved father-in-law and long-time confidant passes away, her mother-in-law, Margaret, 'temporarily' moves in. From rearranging the furniture and taking over the kitchen, to undermining and embarrassing Allie at every turn, including funding her daughter's escape, throwing a hissy fit at the mall, and publicly equating Allie's glass of Chardonnay to full blown alcoholism, Margaret turns Allie's life upside down causing her to bounce between a sincere desire to support her grieving mother-in-law and an intense urge to simply push her out of the nearest window.

Feeling annoyed, trapped and even a little childish, Allie struggles to avoid a complete meltdown with help from her fearless and audacious best friend, a plan for reinventing herself and enjoying a second act, and, yes, a few glasses of Chardonnay. Along the way, Allie discovers the reasons behind Margaret's attitude toward her all these years. Does it help? Maybe...

• 2022 Chick Lit Cafe - CLC Book Excellence Award Winner - Women's Fiction/Humor
• 2022 Indie Book Awards Finalist - Chick Lit (Fiction)
• 2022 Maxy Awards Winner - Literary & Humor
• 2022 Readers' Choice Book Awards - Finalist - Best Adult Book
• 2022 Readers' Favorite - Finalist - Humor/Comedy

Every new romance has its ups and downs...

Its bumps in the road...

Its blackmail notes...

A misunderstanding ties the fates of three men together in this heartfelt, sensual, and uproarious romantic puzzle. Blackmailer's Delight is a tale of lives tossed into the air, then reassembled in some rather unexpected ways.

England 1795

London gentleman Daniel Thornton has just dumped his philandering lover Clarence. He moves to Grantham to care for his ailing uncle and nurse a broken heart. The move he hopes will be a fresh start - a place to discover himself and perhaps a new way of seeing the world.

Luke Morley is a draper's son struggling to accept his sexuality. He has withdrawn into a world of fantasy, but with the arrival of Mr. Thronton this private world is shattered. Grantham's most eligible bachelor is everything Luke has ever dreamed of. After months of silent admiration, he determines to introduce himself.

Re-enter Clarence, who arrives to win back his old lover. When Daniel rejects him again, he is not about to take it lying down...

A blackmail note appears - a demand that Daniel marry one of Luke's sisters. A demand that he fulfill Luke's sexual desires.

Daniel saw young Mr. Morley leave the note on his mantle.

The note is from Luke.

Isn't it?

"There's No Place Like Home is a page-turning rollercoaster ride full of surprises, set-backs, and triumphs." –Lisa Smith, author of Girl Walks Out of a Bar

Claire and Gary, college sweethearts, married for decades were at an impasse. They had been together forever, and started taking each other for granted. When faced with problems they would normally tackle together, they turned elsewhere and struggled to find their way home.

Gary finds his biological family, Claire struggles with identity issues, and their son is forced to become an adult.

Will they be able to overcome sickness, addiction and deceit and remember what brought them together?

Raw, wild, proudly shocking fiction of 1990s Vegas life." – BookLife Review

Dive into the kaleidoscopic streets of 1990s Las Vegas with Surviving GenX.

Amidst the flickering neon lights and the haunting echoes of slot machines, we follow an unnamed protagonist and a battered housewife, both seeking an escape from their tormented pasts. As they wade through the city's seedy underbelly, they find an unexpected refuge in one another—a bond forged in the fires of a metropolis hell-bent on their ruin.

A potent tapestry of humor, heartbreak, and raw human resilience, this narrative unfolds with the surreal quality of a fever dream. Oscillating between the chaos of a city that never sleeps and the quiet moments of vulnerability shared between its two protagonists, "Surviving GenX" isn't just a story—it's an experience. An experience that delves into the desolation of a generation caught amidst the disintegration of societal norms, searching for meaning in a world that seems to have forgotten them.

Join this evocative journey through a decade marked by upheaval and transformation and discover a tale that is once a testament to the indomitable spirit of Generation X and a haunting reflection on the universal human quest for connection.


Our early readers can't stop talking about this book:

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “…Surviving Gen X brought me back to the 90s… Just raw uncensored emotions and I don't think I have read anything similar since… I loved these stories, and I'm in awe of all these characters that you introduced to the world” Netgalley reviewer

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “…unlike anything I’ve ever read… so original not only in the style they are written, but in the variety of emotions one feels when reading them…” Goodreads reviewer

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “…truly a page-turner that makes ourselves embark on our own self-discovery journey… This book will truly take the readers back as they dive into a world of love, loss, and redemption in Las Vegas’ magnetic streets.” Amazon reviewer

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “…whoa what a ride… between a gut punch and giggle… but I will warn you that this book might not be suitable for the little ones…” Goodreads reviewer

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “The characters come to life… Through their multiple battles, you will experience their struggles, wins, and intimate moments, which will make you relate and look life through other perspective…” Amazon reviewer

'Tis done.

The world is a most confused and unsteady place -- especially London, center of finance, innovation, and conspiracy -- in the year 1714, when Daniel Waterhouse makes his less-than-triumphant return to England's shores. Aging Puritan and Natural Philosopher, confidant of the high and mighty and contemporary of the most brilliant minds of the age, he has braved the merciless sea and an assault by the infamous pirate Blackbeard to help mend the rift between two adversarial geniuses at a princess's behest. But while much has changed outwardly, the duplicity and danger that once drove Daniel to the American Colonies is still coin of the British realm.

No sooner has Daniel set foot on his homeland when he is embroiled in a dark conflict that has been raging in the shadows for decades. It is a secret war between the brilliant, enigmatic Master of the Mint and closet alchemist Isaac Newton and his archnemesis, the insidious counterfeiter Jack the Coiner, a.k.a. Jack Shaftoe, King of the Vagabonds. Hostilities are suddenly moving to a new and more volatile level, as Half-Cocked Jack plots a daring assault on the Tower itself, aiming for nothing less than the total corruption of Britain's newborn monetary system.

Unbeknownst to all, it is love that set the Coiner on his traitorous course; the desperate need to protect the woman of his heart -- the remarkable Eliza, Duchess of Arcachon-Qwghlm -- from those who would destroy her should he fail. Meanwhile, Daniel Waterhouse and his Clubb of unlikely cronies comb city and country for clues to the identity of the blackguard who is attempting to blow up Natural Philosophers with Infernal Devices -- as political factions jockey for position while awaiting the impending death of the ailing queen; as the "holy grail" of alchemy, the key to life eternal, tantalizes and continues to elude Isaac Newton, yet is closer than he ever imagined; as the greatest technological innovation in history slowly takes shape in Waterhouse's manufactory.

Everything that was will be changed forever ...

The System of the World is the concluding volume in Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle, begun with Quicksilver and continued in The Confusion.

"Intriguing, ambitious, and pretty damn delightful. I thoroughly enjoyed 'Hugh' and it gave me a lot to think about. This is a unique and exhilarating journey." – Alexis Hall, author of Boyfriend Material

From an old family trunk comes a manuscript which never saw the light of day. Its pages tell of a young man awakening to himself, his sexuality, and his world in this love letter to the era of Tom Jones.

The slightly spoiled, slightly poetical, slightly absurd son of an ambitious baronet, Hugh Entwistle possesses the wealth and connections to make him a success in Georgian England. But before pursuing a sinecure in the military, he will spend the summer of 1768 at his country estate – far from the turmoil in London this politically volatile year.

Only to discover a deeper, more profound turmoil within himself when he encounters the rebellious, and beautiful, son of the parish parson.

So begins the hilarious and heart-breaking collapse of a well-ordered world. Hugh paints a sprawling canvas of 18th century England – a world of wig powder and heeled slippers, of connivers and blackmailers, in which the search for Liberty will require Hugh to redefine the rules of the game.

Readers are enchanted with Hugh: A Hero without a Novel:

“Sui generis, thoroughly interesting, fabulously vivid in place and time. It’s extremely and realistically Georgian. A queer bildungsroman with more than a nod to Tom Jones, Tristram Shandy and the like. I found it absolutely fascinating...”
– KJ Charles, author of The Secret Lives of Country Gentleman (The Doomsday Books)

"'Hugh' is a deliciously satirical comedy, written in an antiquated syntax appropriate to the 18th century setting. At first entranced by, and then denied beauty, passion, and ecstasy (and what passion! ...the Sorrows of Young Werther came to mind...), Hugh becomes indifferent to offered pleasure until, at last, and in deathly fear of exposure, he attains the (outrageously, hilariously warped) Sublime." – Maria Huttenrauch, NetGalley Reviews

“…a work of queer historical archiving that’s as admirable and remarkable as its hero.” – Kirkus Reviews

“As good as the story is, and it’s a grand, queer coming-of-age story filled with colorful characters, voice and writing made it a 10-star novel for me. The quality of the writing and the spot-on timbre of the voice fully immerses the reader into Hugh’s world without a misstep in this seamless historical narrative.” – Coffee and Ink

“This book was everything I look for in a book. Page turning, as in couldn't put it down, intelligent, believable, made me laugh, made me cry and inspired my first ever book review. I'm not a man or gay but David Lawrence's writing helped me see each character. His books should be required reading.” – Belinda Alexander, NetGalley Reviews

“To set something like this account in the eighteenth century is no mean achievement. It is a work of literature and a tour de force.” – Briefstalk, Amazon Reviewer