Showing results by narrator "Laurel Lefkow" in All Categories

Biographer Alexandra Popoff traces the life and creative achievement of Ayn Rand (1905–1982), one of America’s most provocative writers and whose best-selling novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged have enjoyed impressive longevity. Born into a Jewish family in Saint Petersburg, Russia, Rand (then Alisa Rosenbaum) lived through the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, Civil War, and the onset of Soviet totalitarian dictatorships––experiences that made her profoundly anticommunist.

The last person Alice Shipley expected to see since arriving in Tangier with her new husband was Lucy Mason. After the horrific accident at Bennington, the two friends - once inseparable roommates - haven't spoken in over a year. But Lucy is standing there, trying to make things right. Perhaps Alice should be happy. She has not adjusted to life in Morocco, too afraid to venture out into the bustling medinas and oppressive heat. Lucy, always fearless and independent, helps Alice emerge from her flat and explore the country.

Every year the Levin children have looked forward to spending the summer at their grandmother's historic island home, but this year it's not to be. Blair, the oldest sister, is marooned in Boston, pregnant with twins and unable to travel. Middle sister Kirby is caught up in the thrilling vortex of civil rights protests with her friend Mary Jo Kopechne. And Tiger, the only son, has just been deployed to Vietnam.

Camille Gardner is a grieving mother who, five years after her daughter's death, is obsessed with the man she believes to be responsible. Because Camille wants revenge. Enter: the Collective. A group of women who desire justice above all else. A group of women who enact revenge on the men who have wronged them. But as Camille gets more involved in the group she must decide whether these women are the heroes or the villains. And if she chooses wrong, will she ever get out alive?

1940, Nazi-occupied Paris. A powerful story of love, tragedy and incredible courage, about one woman whose life is ripped apart by war and risks everything to seek justice. Paris, 2003. When the opportunity arises for aspiring journalist Emma Keane to interview world-renowned perfumer Madame De Cadieux about her life during World War Two, she is determined to take it. There are secrets from her own family history that she hopes Angéline may be able to help unlock. But nothing can prepare Emma for Angéline's story and one thing is for certain - it will change her own life forever.

Our quoted authority is not the people in white coats but those with a quill, a heart and a soul that can take these feelings of love and loss and with the ink of words put to verse feelings and emotions that can be re-lived and shared by all. As they venture through depression, war, slavery to heartache and the loss of loved ones our eyes may mist and tears gently fall at what collectively we have done, have experienced, have witnessed and lost.

Have you ever loved someone so much that you'd do anything for them? When Dr Luke Findley turns up to his hospital shift in the small town of St Andrews, Maine, he's expecting just another evening of minor injuries and domestic disputes. But instead, Lanore McIlvrae walks into his life - and changes it forever. For Lanny is a woman with a past...Lanny McIlvrae is unlike anyone Luke has ever met.

Six-year-old Sheila was abandoned by her mother on a highway when she was four. A survivor of horrific abuse, she never spoke, never cried, and was placed in a class for severely retarded children after committing an atrocious act of violence against another child. Everyone thought Sheila was beyond salvation - except her teacher, Torey Hayden. With patience, skill, and abiding love, she fought long and hard to release a haunted little girl from her secret nightmare.

Drawing on Cindy’s own research, teaching and fieldwork in democratic theory and practice over the past three decades, How to Be A Citizen is a hopeful handbook for a more egalitarian and democratic world. Cindy proposes six ideas across six areas we should care about most – leadership, public education, race and immigration, the environment, community and fundamental rights – and shows us how we can take steps in each of these areas to be better, truer citizens.

Helen Ross, a twenty-nine-year-old biologist, is sent to a sleepy Rocky Mountain ranching town to defend a pack of wolves from those who want to destroy them. For in Hope, Montana, a century ago, the wolf was slaughtered to extinction, and though they're now protected by law as an endangered species, the old hatred runs deep. Alone in this hostile place, bruised by a broken love affair, Helen struggles for self-esteem and survival, embarking on a dangerous alliance with the son of her most ferocious opponent, the brutal and charismatic Buck Calder.

The world's most exclusive rehab clinic offers treatment to the rich and famous. Meg's sister Haley was one of them - a troubled country singer running from a terrible addiction. Between the luxury spa, the ayurvedic yoga and the world-class therapy, the clinic is a perfect place to heal and brush shoulders with the world's most beautiful people. Safely locked in the secluded compound, its patients are a thousand miles away from crazed fans and paparazzi...with no one to call for help. When Haley is found dead at the clinic, Meg checks in under an alias to find out why.

When you return from a work trip to find your husband dead in the pond, it’s best not to call him a liar and a cheat in front of the cops. Especially when you’ve spent the last few years telling anyone who’ll listen that you sometimes fantasize about killing him. It makes you look kind of, well, guilty.

Migration, terrorism, the tensions between global capitalism and nationalism, the promise and peril of a technological and communications revolution: these forces shaped the life and work of Joseph Conrad at the dawn of the 20th century. In this brilliant new interpretation of one of the great voices in modern literature, Maya Jasanoff reveals Conrad as a prophet of globalization as we recognize it today.

1999: An island off the southern coast of Greece. Art historian Elizabeth Clarke arrives with the intent to acquire a rare female sculpture. But what begins as a quest for a highly valued cultural artifact evolves into a trip that will force Elizabeth to contend with her career, her ambition, and her troubling history. Disoriented by jet lag, debilitating migraines, and a dependence on prescription pills, Elizabeth turns to her charming and guileless translator to guide her around the labyrinthine island. Soon, the island's lushness take hold of Elizabeth.

When feminist writer Susan Faludi learned that her 76-year-old father - long estranged and living in Hungary - had undergone sex reassignment surgery, that investigation would turn personal and urgent. How was this new parent who claimed to be 'a complete woman now' connect to the silent, explosive and ultimately violent father that she had known, the photographer who'd built his career on the alteration of images? Faludi chases that mystery into the recesses of her suburban childhood and her father's many previous incarnations.

Bee's family runs a lakeside inn, offering rest and sustenance to weary travellers. Bee's Nan has gone missing, possibly drowned, but Bee knows that can't be true. And so does the hungry fox that her grandmother was feeding. Shadow is cross that her supply of salmon has dried up and is determined to do something about it. Soon both fox and child are on an adventure to find Nan, uncover what's happening to all the secret islands on the Great Lake and learn just how far magical powers can take you...

Sarah McAdams needs a fresh start. So she's come home to the shores of Oregon's wild Columbia river, to renovate the old Victorian mansion where she grew up. Her daughters, Jade and Gracie, aren't impressed by the run-down property, and as soon as they pull up the isolated drive, Sarah too is beset by uneasy memories - of her cold, distant mother, of the half-sister who vanished without a trace, and of a long-ago night when Sarah was found outside, feverish and delirious.

Patricia Highsmith was one of the great 20th-century novelists, celebrated for classics The Talented Mr Ripley, Carol and Strangers on a Train, but she was also a masterful and prolific short-story writer. This definitive new collection, featuring two stories that have never been published before, confirms Highsmith as a genius of the genre. Peerlessly disturbing, exhilarating and savagely funny, Highsmith's stories still have the power to startle, presenting a world that is frighteningly familiar and as relevant today as when they were written.

These novelists burst with a literary energy that is hard to contain. They cover a myriad of styles and themes, narratives packed full of fully-formed characters in powerful tales that have become an essential and integral part of our literary heritage.

Mercy, a young Korean American and recent Columbia graduate, is adrift, undone by a terrible incident in her recent past. Hilary, a wealthy housewife, is haunted by her struggle to have a child, something she believes could save her foundering marriage. Meanwhile, Margaret, once a happily married mother of three, questions her identity in the wake of a shattering loss. As each woman struggles with her own demons, their lives collide in ways that have irreversible consequences for them all.