Showing results by narrator "Laural Merlington" in All Categories

Chicken Soup for the Soul: My Resolution gives you great stories with practical ideas for today's times – for your mind, your body, and your wallet! Everyone makes resolutions – for New Year’s, for big birthdays, for new school years. In fact, most of us are so good at resolutions that we make the same ones year after year. They can be life-changing or really quite simple. Listen to real stories from real people about their year-round resolutions.

Books on Whittaker Chambers and Alger Hiss abound, as countless scholars have labored to uncover the facts behind Chambers's shocking accusation before the House Committee on Un-American Activities in the summer of 1948---that Alger Hiss, a former rising star in the State Department, had been a Communist and engaged in espionage.

Nativity, Missouri, is in trouble. When the small town is bypassed by the newly constructed highway, it loses its much-needed holiday traffic—threatening not only the town’s financial survival, but its very heart and soul. Outside consultant Jake Brisco threatens everything the community...

With only one sleep left before Christmas Eve, Dasher can’t contain her excitement for her favorite holiday. With the sound of Christmas carols on the breeze and twinkling lights radiating from a nearby city, she sneaks off to visit the festivities. But as night deepens and snow starts to fall, Dasher realizes she can no longer spot the North Star in the sky to lead her home. Will the kindness of a child, an unexpected gift, and a dose of Christmas spirit get her back in time to help guide Santa’s sleigh?

Civility and society come head to head in Henry James’ seminal work. The heroine of this powerful novel is the spirited young American Isabel Archer. Blessed by nature and fortune, she journeys to Europe to seek her future, but what she finds may prove to be her undoing. She is courted by three men: an English aristocrat, an American gentleman, and a sensitive expatriate. Her invalid cousin becomes her benefactor and adviser.

Cathy Bissette thought she had left everything behind - the publishing job, the glamour of New York, the broken heart - for a quiet three-month getaway on the shores of North Carolina. But the moment Jared Parsons sailed the lavish Sea Gypsy into Pamlico Sound, she knew her quiet refuge was ruined. She wasn't sure what bothered her more about this stranger - his arrogant attitude or the way he got under her skin.

Patented in 1917, Piggly Wiggly was by far the most influential self-service store of the early twentieth century. Before 1940 it was the only self-service chain with a national distribution network, but it was neither the first nor the only version. Beyond Piggly Wiggly reveals the importance of Piggly Wiggly in the invention of self-service and goes beyond the history of a single firm to explore the role of small business entrepreneurs who invented the first self-service stores in a grassroots social process.

Jubilee lives with her beloved aunt Cora and her faithful dog on a beautiful island. Years ago, when her mother left, Jubilee stopped talking. Now she communicates entirely through gestures, taps, and by drawing cartoons, speaking only when she's alone - or with Dog. This year, Jubilee faces a big change - leaving her small, special classroom for a regular fifth grade class. She likes her new teacher, and finds a maybe-friend in a boy named Mason. But Jubilee's wandering feet won't stop until they find her mother.

The smooth faces of boy soldiers stand out in Civil War photography. Yet until now, scholars have largely overlooked the masses of underaged youths who served as musicians, carried wounded from the field, ran messages, took up arms, and died in both the Union and Confederate armies. Of Age is the first comprehensive study of how Americans responded to the unauthorized enlistment of minors in this conflict and the implications that followed.

Cassandra de Warenne spends her days in a quiet English manor, looking after her young niece, while her sister, Tracey, lives the glamorous life of a jet-setter. When Cass meets Tracey's newest conquest, Antonio de la Barca, she isn't prepared for the intense and immediate attraction - an attraction that heralds something deeper, more powerful, and more dangerous than Cass could ever imagine.

Once there was a little girl from Fargo, North Dakota, named Maggie Goldfarb who grew up, moved to Manhattan, and morphed into Magnolia Gold, the highly paid editor in chief of Lady magazine. With a corner office, a designer wardrobe, and dozens of loyal employees, Magnolia has been hired to update the dowager of women's magazines. She's on her way to giving Lady a face-lift when she is ignominiously replaced.

In a narrative that combines the intensely personal with social, economic, and historical analysis, Susan Jacoby turns an unsparing eye on the marketers of longevity - pharmaceutical companies, lifestyle gurus, and scientific businessmen who suggest that there will soon be a "cure" for the "disease" of aging.

Everyone makes resolutions - for New Year's, for big birthdays, for new school years. In fact, most of us are so good at resolutions that we make the same ones year after year. They can be life-changing or really quite simple. Here are real stories from real people about their year-round resolutions to do with less. simplify and find new meaning in their lives, improve personal relationships, find more time for what's important, and many more practical, heartwarming, and humorous resolutions.

Attracting tens of thousands of men and women hoping to strike it rich, the Klondike gold rush brought with it a frenzy of activity unlike anything the world had ever seen. The few children who lived in Dawson City and its surrounding mining camps had front-row seats to this treasure hunt of the century - and to all the antics that a lust for gold brought with it. In this, her companion book to the best-selling Women of the Klondike, Frances Backhouse explores the experiences of the children who followed their parents north in search of fortune or were born in the goldfields.

The Fernalds are an elderly couple, alone now that their children are grown and, mostly, married. But one of their sons realizes how lonely they must be and decides to bring his family together for the holidays to surprise his parents. First published in 1908, this short novel was followed by a sequel, On Christmas Day in the Evening, in 1910.

You think you know how the world works? Think again. 21st Century America Magic has faded from the minds of mankind, until an encounter between Melisande Stokes, linguistics expert at Harvard, and Tristan Lyons, shadowy agent of government, leads to the uncovering of a distant past. After...

A peaceful, neighborly village, darkened by legends of death. Who is Nathaniel? For a hundred years, the people of Prairie Bend have whispered the name in wonder and fear. Some say he is simply a folk tale - a legend created to frighten children on cold winter nights. Some swear he is a terrifying spirit returned to avenge the past. And soon...very soon...some will come to believe that Nathaniel lives still - darkly, horrifyingly real.

Ponce Morris is a beautiful, rich widow who's been dubbed "the spare wife" because she's the perfect companion to the wealthy, powerful couples she socializes with. She'll go to sports events with the husbands, throw elegant dinner parties, and shop with the wives.

Alexandra Rafferty works nights for the Miami PD, capturing all the grisly details of crimes scenes on film. She lives with her father, an ex-cop who is slipping into senility, and her louse of a husband, who spends his days dreaming about the perfect crime - and his nights with his mistress. A serial killer is leaving the bodies of young women twisted into strange symbols. Juggling crime photos, Alexandra realizes that the symbols are, in reality, letters of the alphabet -- and that they spell out her name.

How does a Norwegian farm girl become an infamous American serial killer, responsible for upward of 40 murders? "Belle" Storset Sorenson Gunness was constantly dealt bad hands in life - so she decided to take life into her own hands.