Catherine Perce didn't expect tucking her son into bed that night would be the last normal thing she did for a long time. Flashing lights outside her window were the first indication, the second was the knock at the door.

Quarantined.

When a soldier, Captain Jake Deakon takes refuge in her house her ordinary life takes another twist. Together they must survive and protect her son Mitch.

Now that time is up, they must see what awaits them outside their door. Neither could expect the truth they find. Will their new reality be one they can live with?

Jake escapes his horrific captivity as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. Cassie is a caregiver at the military hospital and nurses Jake back to health. Their love begins over a bowl of Jell-O and carries them back home to the Kansas farm.

Everywhere life takes them, there are others with the same haunting dreams of war. Some have only one leg and some have none. Some have just lost their way home. Cassie and Jake begin with one person at a time and over 27 years, hundreds of vets find a little peace on the bank of the farm pond, and they learn to reach back and help another buddy up the hill.

The best and the worst of us live in these pages and the depth of Jake and Cassie’s love can be understood only in the context of the world they dared to change.

How far will you go for love?
From a pregnant fairy godmother to a child bitten by a werewolf, a fallen angel to a mail-order witch, these six fantasy short stories & novellas, connected by magic, will be sure to leave you feeling satisfied.

Fangs & Fairy Dust: An Angels of Sojourn Spin-Off Novella
After eighty years, Ryker returns to Dubuque, hunting down a rogue vampire once again…only this time, the vampire didn’t break his heart.

Aliza is just a normal human trying to say goodbye to the past, but after a brutal attack, she never expected her goodbye to begin an unimaginable future.

The Mail-Order Witch (short story)
The magic in our world is dying. Ettie, one of the last of the pure-blooded witches, gives up on love and embarks on a lonely journey as a mail-order bride to save it. Is the man she's marrying everything she hoped for or is he hiding a secret…
 
Hidden: A Pregnant Fairy Godmother’s Journey… (novella)
Even being the best fairy godmother in all the land, Ciera’s been hiding a secret. Not only is she pregnant, but she’s magically pregnant with a human child.

Humans are not allowed in the fairy realm. Period. That includes half-fairy/half-human babies. The only solution is to give the baby to its father before the Fairy Council finds out her secret.

Finding the father should be easy. How many men named John could possibly live in this place called Chicago?

The Enchanted Apothecary
A grieving shopkeeper becomes suspicious of a mysterious man who keeps visiting her apothecary shop.

One Possible Future: An Angels of Sojourn Short Story
Jocelyn learned not to ignore a vision. Eight years ago, her disregard of a premonition cost her fiancé’s life.
Now, her visions bring her to a fallen angel who is in desperate need of help after losing his wings. The problem: he doesn’t want assistance.

Unwilling to carry any more guilt, Jocelyn insists on helping him, even if it puts her own life in jeopardy.

Bitten: An Angels of Sojourn Spin-Off Short Story
A desperate mother struggles to protect her son.

My life couldn’t get any more ridiculous.

A few days ago, my son’s teacher wanted to berate me on my parenting style.

I politely told her to f*ck off, in so many words.

And now? She’s sitting across the table from me at my first blind date in years.

You can’t make this shit up.

Nothing has been easy since my wife left me and Hunter years ago. And yet, we persevered.

He’s my whole world, and the last thing I have time for is a woman.

But this beautiful teacher disagrees. She wants to help me find the right girl for me and my boy. My best friend agrees. It’s time.

To shut everyone up, I go along with it. How bad can this get?

Don’t ask.

The right woman has been under my nose the whole time. And without realizing it, I’ve fallen deeply in love with her.

I can only hope she’ll stop her silly search and accept my offer.

Be mine.

Forever.

"Don't think you're untouchable…you or your son." Then a dial tone..

Shrewd, hardened New York homicide detective Jasmine (“Jazz") Steele’s just come back from a grisly crime scene involving the body of a brutally-beaten young girl, the second she's investigated this week. That was horrendous, but with these eight words, ending ominously in “your son,” Jazz’s immediate fear is for her vulnerable nephew, Chase, who’s already been through hell in his seven short years. In Kimberly Amato’s hard-boiled yet deeply emotional police procedural, no one is spared tough breaks and turbulent anguish. A lesser cop than Jazz would barely be able to cope.

A year ago, a gruesome car accident claimed the lives of her only brother and his wife, making her the de facto mother of 7-year-old Chase. The sudden household change ended in the loss of her life partner and still best friend, chic police psychologist Frankie, not to mention the dashing of Jazz's lifelong dreams of becoming a successful mystery novelist. Now every day is a battle against Chase’s demons—and her own.

Quick reconnaissance reveals the call wasn't a clever joke courtesy of Hadley, Frankie's droll actress roommate, nor was it Victor, the wry police department coroner who happens to be Jazz's confidante. Further detective work shows the caller wanted Jazz to find him—along with the fresh dead body he left for her in a Harlem warehouse.

With a shadow on Chase and the aid of Frankie's grace-under-fire, not to mention Victor's brandy-fueled heart-to-hearts, Jazz--who has more 'tude than even the toughest investigator, male or female--navigates the cruel streets of New York City while struggling to keep custody of the only family she has left, doggedly in search of the elusive, psychopathic murderer who seems to be summarily killing off women who look suspiciously like someone close to Jazz... and she's not willing to lose yet another person she loves.

Fans of the exciting new wave of hard-boiled women sleuths created by writers like Megan Abbott, Laura Lippmann, Lisa Lutz, and Vicki Hendricks will be attracted to the author’s take-no-prisoners style, and her unflinching attention to harrowing detail.

Yet lovers of traditional mysteries will appreciate the web of fierce loyalty tempered with fearful caution that links Jazz’s tiny but hardy support system—Victor, Frankie, and Hadley, not to mention Chase himself. Somehow or other, Amato manages to mix all the excitement of an action thriller with the swirling emotions of a mainstream psychological novel.

Those with a weakness for badass female cops like Mary Shannon of In Plain Sight and Olivia Benson of Law & Order SVU will revel in Jasmine Steele's gritty determination laced with compassion. Readers of lesbian mysteries will be reminded of  Sandra Scoppettone’s Lauren Laurano and Laurie R. King’s Kate Martinelli.

And it's also a great read for fans of resilient heroines of psychological thrillers like Liz Keen of The Blacklist and Carrie Mathison of Homeland, who will love Jasmine Steele's fearlessness, tinged with the very real emotional roller coaster of love turned to grief.

"(Amato) makes Detective Steele a winning female character, and... introduces comic relief at just the right moments. This is very fine writing by a lady who knows the idiom!"

-- Grady Harp, San Francisco Review of Books

EDITOR'S NOTE: AN EARLIER EDITION OF THIS BOOK WAS ENTITLED STEELE RESOLVE. THIS IS A NEW EDITION, GUARANTEED ERROR-FREE! AND WE DO MEAN GUARANTEED--YOUR MONEY BACK IF YOU DISAGREE

Heath was never my brother.

Nor my step brother, or any other relation our family tried to impose on us.

He was always just Heath, and at the end he was my Heath.
Ten years ago he disappeared, and within three years of his absence he’d taken over Hollywood.

The world my father built.

The world he wasn’t good enough for.

The world he’d been denied when he was told he couldn’t have me.

Now he’s back, and he only wants one thing…to take it all.

Even me.

Hollywood King is Wuthering Heights crashed into the glitz and glam of Hollywood Royalty. A stand alone book with the happily ever after you always wanted for Cathy and Heathcliff.

We promised each other a sweet, hot forever. Then we found out what happens after "happily ever after."

Brilliant, handsome professor Dean West is everything I've ever wanted, but didn't think I would have. My troubled past left me wary and guarded. But when Dean rescued me from mix-up with college courses, the spark between us turned into a firestorm. As he taught me about desire and trust, this warm, sexy man always kept me safe.

And for three years, our hot, loving marriage has been unbreakable.

Or so I thought.

Then one simple question provokes an alarming chain of events that threatens to tear us apart forever.

Not once have I believed Dean would lie to me...until he does.

Not once have I believed I would betray him...until I do.

Not once have I believed we would ever be apart...until we are.

***

Welcome to Spiral of Bliss. Liv and Dean's everlasting romance will melt your heart, turn you on, and enchant you with the power of a love to end all loves.

Reading Order:

AROUSE
ALLURE
AWAKEN
ARRIVE
BREAK THE SKY
ADORE
ALWAYS

A murder brought them together. Will the killer rip them apart?

Kit’s blunt attitude keeps people at a distance. It’s the best way for the dairy farmer stave off the painful rejection she received from her parents and later her guardian Lincoln. But a shocking murder on her farm brings back the handsome man from her past in a big way…

Police Sgt. Lincoln Zanetti wishes he could’ve revealed his feelings for Kit years ago. Keeping their past secret, he uses his assignment to the case to protect the woman he loves. But even his pent-up affection can’t keep her from being a suspect or a target…

As their passion blooms anew, the ruthless murderer strikes the farm again. Can Lincoln and Kit put the killer away before their second chance at love turns deadly?

Nothing to Lose is the final standalone novel in The Blackbridge Series of romantic suspense. If you like tough women, stoic men, and small-town romance, you’ll love Claire Boston’s nail-biting tale.

Buy Nothing to Lose to rediscover romance today!

“Mayer’s dark theme touches on the state of human brokenness and how it can fracture our relationships, our loves and ourselves.” –Authors Reading

Twenty-year-old Billy Johnson is afflicted by the hollowness.

All reason is lost when it has him in its grip, pushing him towards acts of unspeakable cruelty. When a hiking accident leaves him injured on an isolated mountain, facing imminent death, Billy looks for meaning in his tragic life. The hollowness, a malevolent force that consumes him, is responsible for the loss of everything good in his life: a relationship with his father, his beloved younger brother Henry, and the first woman to love him, Lisa.

At the peak of despair, on the cusp of death, he encounters a strange old man, who is eerily familiar. Is this Billy’s last chance to redeem his troubled life and rid himself of the hollowness?

One summer. One touch...

Cadence Riley didn’t have time for boys – no matter how potent their smiles were. School and working at Camp Riley were her only priorities. She knew better than to fall for someone like Fitz Quinn, the spoiled bad boy son of a wealthy politician. But the second he spoke to her, she knew she was in over her head. He was a gorgeous trouble maker with a cocky attitude. Her heart warned her, but she didn’t listen. There was something protective and good beneath the bad boy exterior that made her insides flutter. Before she knew it, she fell hard and fast.

Fitz wasn’t prepared to meet a girl like Cadence. She was shy and innocent – and nothing like the girls who usually flocked his doorstep. How could he resist her mile-long blond hair and emerald eyes? He knew he shouldn’t want her. His father already had other plans for him and a relationship with her could never go beyond the summer. He thought their stolen kisses by the lake were only supposed to be a summer fling. Falling for her shouldn’t have happened. But it did.

Now the clock is counting down until Fitz has to return to the life that awaits him in Washington D.C. As September draws closer, how will they survive the end of everything they’ve come to love?

*Cadence Untouched is the first book in the Cadence duet. Cadence Defined will release on Februrary 26, 2019!

“Thriller writing at its best. Thriller enthusiasts who relish the precise execution of an international thriller, but who seek the psychological depth and believability of a protagonist who simultaneously fields professional and personal life challenges, will find this a gripping story that's hard to put down.”
--Midwest Book Review, Diane Donovan (regarding Any Means Necessary)

“One of the best thrillers I have read this year. The plot is intelligent and will keep you hooked from the beginning. The author did a superb job creating a set of characters who are fully developed and very much enjoyable. I can hardly wait for the sequel.”
--Books and Movie Reviews, Roberto Mattos (re Any Means Necessary)

When nuclear waste is stolen by jihadists in the middle of the night from an unguarded New York City hospital, the police, in a frantic race against time, call in the FBI. Luke Stone, head of an elite, secretive, department within the FBI, is the only man they can turn to. Luke realizes right away that the terrorists’ aim is to create a dirty bomb, that they seek a high-value target, and that they will hit it within 48 hours.

A cat and mouse chase follows, pitting the world’s most savvy government agents versus its most sophisticated terrorists. As Agent Stone peels back layer after layer, he soon realizes he is up against a vast conspiracy, and that the target is even more high value than he could have imagined—leading all the way to the President of the United States.

With Luke framed for the crime, his team threatened and his own family in danger, the stakes could not be higher. But as a former special forces commando, Luke has been in tough positions before, and he will not give up until he finds a way to stop them—using any means necessary.

Twist follows twist as one man finds himself up against an army of obstacles and conspiracies, pushing even the limits of what he can handle, and culminating in a shocking climax.

A political thriller with heart-pounding action, dramatic international settings, and non-stop suspense, ANY MEANS NECESSARY marks the debut of an explosive new series that will leave you turning pages late into the night.

Book #2 in the Luke Stone series is also now available!

Keep her secret

Keep her safe

On the 14th November 1940, Hitler’s bombs rain down on Coventry. From the rubble of a bombed-out family home, a young girl is saved…

This is a stunning and memorable page-turner of love, loss and resilience for fans of The Tattooist of Auschwitz

As the Nazis’ relentless bombs fall during the Blitz of Coventry, six-year-old Rose Sherbourne finds herself orphaned and under the guardianship of a Cornish farmer's daughter, Elenor Cardew.

Elenor knows that the only way to protect spirited Rose is to leave the city and make a new life for themselves away from harm. But soon Elenor discovers that Hitler’s firestorm is not the only thing she must fear when she learns a devastating secret about Rose…

With Rose’s life in imminent danger, Elenor turns to the only person she can trust to keep the deadly secret, heroic Canadian pilot, Jackson St John. And amidst the destruction of war, an unlikely romance blossoms as they find a way to protect the child they have both grown to love…and each other.

Readers LOVE The Secret Orphan:

‘Keeps you wanting to read into the small hours’ Lisa, Goodreads

‘The best and most beautiful book I've read in a long time’ Brid, Netgalley

‘Simply amazing’ Rikki-Doodlebug's Book Reviews

‘Captivated from beginning to end’ Jessyca, Goodreads

‘A gripping, page turner set in WWII … Loved it’ Amanda, Netgalley

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the master of the novel of international intrigue comes a riveting new book as timely and unsettling as tomorrow's headlines.

It is summer 1999 in Russia, a country on the threshold of anarchy.  An interim president sits powerless in Moscow as his nation is wracked by famine and inflation, crime and corruption, and seething hordes of the unemployed roam the streets.

For the West, Russia is a basket case.  But for Igor Komarov, one-time army sergeant who has risen to leadership of the right-wing UPF party, the chaos is made to order.  As he waits in the wings for the presidential election of January 2000, his striking voice rings out over the airwaves offering the roiling masses hope at last—not only for law, order, and prosperity, but for restoring the lost greatness of their land.

Who is this man with the golden tongue who is so quickly becoming the promise of a Russia reborn?  A document stolen from party headquarters and smuggled to Washington and London sends nightmare chills through those who remember the past, for this Black Manifesto is pure Mein Kampf in a country with frightening parallels to the Germany of the Weimar Republic.

Officially the West can do nothing, but in secret a group of elder statesmen sends the only person who can expose the truth about Komarov into the heart of the inferno.  Jason Monk, ex-CIA and "the best damn agent-runner we ever had," had sworn he would never return to Moscow, but one name changes his mind.  Colonel Anatoli Grishin, the KGB officer who tortured and murdered four of Monk's agents after they had been betrayed by Aldrich Ames, is now Komarov's head of security.

Monk has a dual mission: to stop Komarov, whatever it takes, and to prepare the way for an icon worthy of the Russian people.  But he has a personal mission as well: to settle the final score with Grishin.  To do this he must stay alive--and the forces allied against him are ruthless, the time frighteningly short. . . . 

Praise for Icon

“Vintage Forsyth, intricate, exact and gripping.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Another strong performance by a writer who knows exactly what he's about, and who here catalyzes narrative with another memorable protagonist, the stealthy and daring Monk.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“One of his best works for a long time, which provides an all-too-real look at a chilling new millennium.”—The Sunday Times, London

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

“Comprehensive, enlightening, and terrifyingly timely.”
—New York Times Book Review

“Cool and persuasive... How Democracies Die comes at exactly the right moment.”
—The Washington Post

Donald Trump’s presidency has raised a question that many of us never thought we’d be asking: Is our democracy in danger? Harvard professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt have spent more than twenty years studying the breakdown of democracies in Europe and Latin America, and they believe the answer is yes. Democracy no longer ends with a bang—in a revolution or military coup—but with a whimper: the slow, steady weakening of critical institutions, such as the judiciary and the press, and the gradual erosion of long-standing political norms. The good news is that there are several exit ramps on the road to authoritarianism. The bad news is that, by electing Trump, we have already passed the first one.

Drawing on decades of research and a wide range of historical and global examples, from 1930s Europe to contemporary Hungary, Turkey, and Venezuela, to the American South during Jim Crow, Levitsky and Ziblatt show how democracies die—and how ours can be saved.

The instant New York Times and #1 Sunday Times bestselling author of the “riveting thriller” (PopSugar) Then She Was Gone delivers another suspenseful page-turner about a shocking murder in a picturesque and well-to-do English town, perfect “for fans of Gone Girl, The Girl on the Train, and Luckiest Girl Alive” (Library Journal).

Melville Heights is one of the nicest neighborhoods in Bristol, England; home to doctors and lawyers and old-money academics. It’s not the sort of place where people are brutally murdered in their own kitchens. But it is the sort of place where everyone has a secret. And everyone is watching you.

As the headmaster credited with turning around the local school, Tom Fitzwilliam is beloved by one and all—including Joey Mullen, his new neighbor, who quickly develops an intense infatuation with this thoroughly charming yet unavailable man. Joey thinks her crush is a secret, but Tom’s teenaged son Freddie—a prodigy with aspirations of becoming a spy for MI5—excels in observing people and has witnessed Joey behaving strangely around his father.

One of Tom’s students, Jenna Tripp, also lives on the same street, and she’s not convinced her teacher is as squeaky clean as he seems. For one thing, he has taken a particular liking to her best friend and fellow classmate, and Jenna’s mother—whose mental health has admittedly been deteriorating in recent years—is convinced that Mr. Fitzwilliam is stalking her.

Meanwhile, twenty years earlier, a schoolgirl writes in her diary, charting her doomed obsession with a handsome young English teacher named Mr. Fitzwilliam…

In Lisa Jewell’s latest brilliant “bone-chilling suspense” (People) no one is who they seem—and everyone is hiding something. Who has been murdered—and who would have wanted one of their neighbors dead? As “Jewell teases out her twisty plot at just the right pace” (Booklist, starred review), you will be kept guessing until the startling revelation on the very last page.

A man's quest to find answers for those who are haunted by the past leads him deeper into the shadows in this electrifying New York Times bestseller from the author of Promise Not to Tell.

Quinton Zane is back.

Jack Lancaster, consultant to the FBI, has always been drawn to the coldest of cold cases, the kind that law enforcement either considers unsolvable or else has chalked up to accidents or suicides. As a survivor of a fire, he finds himself uniquely compelled by arson cases. His almost preternatural ability to get inside the killer's head has garnered him a reputation in some circles--and complicated his personal life. The more cases Jack solves, the closer he slips into the darkness. His only solace is Winter Meadows, a meditation therapist. After particularly grisly cases, Winter can lead Jack back to peace.

But as long as Quinton Zane is alive, Jack will not be at peace for long. Having solidified his position as the power behind the throne of his biological family's hedge fund, Zane sets out to get rid of Anson Salinas's foster sons, starting with Jack.