Showing results by narrator "Amy Melissa Bentley" in All Categories

Sharee Samuels was 17 and 256 pounds when she hit her rock bottom. But with incredible determination and an unflaggingly positive attitude, she went on to lose more than 100 pounds over the course of five years. When she began documenting her journey on Tumblr, she never expected to become such a powerful voice for health, fitness, and self-love. But her blog, called Funeral for My Fat, soon morphed into an inspirational guide for hundreds of thousands of individuals looking for support and advice on their own fitness journeys.

Tristan Lopez is loyal to his brothers. He doesn't really have a choice, born into a gang that has a choke hold on every kid who roams its streets. He gave his life to them willingly, knowing if he did, then one day, this kingdom, led by boys drunk with power and ruled by fear, would all be his. Riley Rojas took up space on his streets, her loud mouth fearless in the face of the gang leaders who terrified everyone else. She pushed Tristan around on the hard court, and she balled better than his friends - better than him sometimes. She challenged him. She needed him. He liked it. 

Jesse Dylan was my best friend, my first kiss...and my first heartbreak. Watching him walk out of my life almost ruined me. But years have passed; the pain of losing him has long since faded. Or so I thought. One glimpse in his cobalt eyes and those old wounds reopened. Jesse wants a second chance at what might have been, but it's too late. I'm with someone new. Someone safe. Someone who can't break me. Yet the heart wants what it wants, and mine has only ever beat for the one who got away. I can't deny him. I can't resist him. He consumes my every waking thought and invades my dreams.

Once upon a time, a beautiful queen was cursed by a dark faery. That curse, inherited by twin princesses, Aura and Luna, binds their lives in the strangest of ways. At an early age, the girls were more than sisters. They were the strongest of allies until a combination of jealousy, anger, and dark magic tore their relationship to shreds. Aura took everything from Luna: her home, her family, and her love by murdering the prince who'd chosen her instead of Aura. Luna wants revenge, but she's running out of time. 

Anne Norris moved to Savannah, Georgia, for a fresh start. Now her pirate-tour business is flagging, and paying the rent requires more than wishful thinking. When she discovers evidence of a shipwreck off the coast of Tybee Island, she knows it could be just the boon she needs to stay afloat. She takes her findings to local museum director Carter Hale for confirmation, but she runs after a disastrous first meeting. Carter has been searching for the location of the wreck detailed in the worn pages of an 18th-century diary. But convincing Anne to help him is no easy task.

When his wife suddenly drops dead during a family picnic, Adam Collins doesn't think things could possibly get any worse. That is until they do. Family pressure begins to mount for Adam to find a new wife, far sooner than he would like, but he does need help with his young children. Alice Wesley just lost her sister. Her brother Nathan has lost his mind with grief. She will stop at nothing to protect her sister's children, even from her own brother. Now the unthinkable has happened, and it's up to Alice to find a way of escape, both for herself and the innocent children in her care.

Katie has always imagined her life being just like Mamm's. It's why she chose baptism and why she'll soon marry Abram Zook. But ever since her twin sister, Hannah, left, the only thing that truly makes Katie smile is the sketchpad in which she indulges her talent for drawing faces - a sin that, if discovered, could get her shunned by her family, her friends, and even Abram. Yet Katie sees her secret pastime as the only way to quiet a growing restlessness she'd just as soon ignore. That is, until their Mamm's untimely death brings Hannah back home to Pennsylvania.

The 2008 financial crisis crystallized for people around the country the fact that something was wrong. Americans had already been losing faith in elites who had failed to protect them from crisis after crisis and disaster after disaster. After the collapse, we expected someone to have a solution but were inevitably disappointed. Instead, we got high and rising unemployment, foreclosures spiraling out of control, and, as the protest chant went, "banks got bailed out, we got sold out."

Just when Sarah Engels thinks things can't get any worse when her abusive husband threatens to take her life on almost a daily basis, she finds out that she's pregnant with his child. Mike Collins has failed once to protect a wife, and without a wife or the children he's always wanted, he becomes a hermit deep in the woods and lives every day with only his dog for company. When he stumbles upon a nearly dead beauty, he knows that his time for redemption has finally come, but he has no idea just how much he's in for when it comes to rescuing her and her unborn child.

When the lights go out at a Georgia high school football game, senior Macy Atwood finds herself in the arms of a boy who kisses her senseless - but he's gone by the time the lights come back on. All she knows is that there was something special - and oddly familiar - about her mystery kisser. Noah Granger, Ridgedale's resident bad boy and newest transfer student, has no problem taking credit for the kiss, but Macy can't shake the feeling that he's lying. Especially since a photograph of Macy and former star football player Joel Hargrove resurfaced online moments before the blackout.

When Elizabeth Kaufman received the news of her husband's death at the Battle of Vicksburg in 1863, she felt only relief. She determined that she would never be at the mercy of any man again, even if it meant she would never have a family of her own. Then Aaron Zook comes home with her brother when the war ends two years later.

Ruby Weaver's curly red hair isn't the only thing that sets her apart from her Amish community in 1863. Twenty-eight and single, Ruby doesn't believe a woman needs to be married in order to be happy. Her ailing friend Lovinia Fischer, however, has other ideas and wants Ruby to promise to marry her husband after she dies. Never imagining she'd have to fulfill that vow, Ruby agrees. And she's not the only one. Lovinia has extracted a similar promise from her husband, Gideon. 

Cassie's had a rough few months. Being a vampire came with its own risks. Being a con-artist vampire was even tougher. Being forced to fake one's own death to keep from getting thrown in the slammer or murdered and then resurrecting oneself? Really takes a lot out of a girl. Frankly, she could use a little down time. But, true to form, she's skipped that and opted to jump straight from the frying pan into the fire as a new recruit-in-training for the Old Guard. They think she's got the skill set to help them ferret out some troublemaking vampires in the Undercity.

My twin brother, Damon, and I grew up in the shadows of the supernatural, trained by our father, a legendary hunter and an Elder in a world you wouldn't believe exists. But now, Dad's gone missing, and we're on a treacherous path to find him. We thought we knew the drill-stake 'em, salt 'em, save the day. That was until we met our newest nightmare: vampires, or so we thought, leaving nothing but skeletons in their wake. Then there's Justice, a vampire fighting his own kind, a guy from some group called the Paranormal Mercenary Corp. Trusting a vampire? Not exactly in our playbook.

She was my first love. She was my everything. We were college sweethearts, the All-American couple. Until the big time came calling. Misunderstandings and miscommunications lead to broken hearts and broken trust. But fate throws me a second chance when our paths cross again. Now Poppy has to decide if she's ready to take another try at forever with me, or if the past is better left behind us. I know this is my final down. My last opportunity to make it right, but Poppy's going to need a little more convincing. Throwing out a Hail Mary, I'll give it all I've got.   

Eight thousand years before the rise of the Raven Queen and the second breaking of the world, a simple vintner defies gods and demons alike on his trek into the underworld to reclaim the family that was stolen from him. Armed with nothing but his steadfast love and his skills at growing grapes and making wine, Z'nnek confronts the terrors in the dark beneath the world.

I'm the first Vampire human hybrid. Someday I will reclaim my father's throne. Until then, I'm stuck in freaking high school. No one knows I survived the attack on my royal family all those years ago. I owe my life to my guardians, two ancient Vampires who would give their lives to protect me. I might have unspeakable powers of night, but right now? I need to pass AP calc, make a couple of friends, and try not to drink the sweet, young blood of my classmates. Being in hiding means pretending I'm a nice, normal, human teenage girl, and that's the hardest part.

Prince Carden of Tierney lost his home, family, and claim to the throne in one fell swoop when he rebelled against his father for a cause he knew was right. Instead of wallowing in despair, he embarks on a new journey, starting a new life on the Southern Isle. When he finds himself caught in a web woven by the famously ruthless fae queen, Coeur, he insults her and she vows to teach him the most difficult and heart-breaking lesson he will ever learn: that humans are incapable of love, and that hearts are beastly things.   

Rebuilding a life while still missing an identity isn't easy, but that's what Adara's determined to do. It's why she's been ignoring the overtures from an elegant vampire and the stalking by an overprotective werewolf. However, when a mysterious presence begins to haunt her memories - and dreams - wakening a primal terror, she has no choice but to ask for help. The problem is, unraveling her secret past seems to be triggering demon attacks. Someone doesn't want her finding answers.

Claire is a 16-year-old fangirl obsessed with the show Demon Heart. Forest is an actor on Demon Heart who dreams of bigger roles. When the two meet at a local Comic-Con panel, it's a dream come true for Claire. Until the Q&A, that is, when Forest laughs off Claire's assertion that his character is gay. Claire is devastated. After all, every last word of her super-popular fanfic revolves around the romance between Forest's character and his male frenemy. She can't believe her hero turned out to be a closed-minded jerk.