The Hillbilly Debutante Cafe


Book Description

Welcome to El Dorado Springs, Missouri, Population 3,021. It doesn't look like much from the outside, but it doesn't take long-any time at all, really-to realize there's much more than meets the eye. That's how Molly McCarty feels, anyway. After deciding she's had enough of the big-city life as a politician's wife in Washington, Molly moves back to her hometown and buys the abandoned Serenity Farm. Molly acclimates herself to life in a small town with the help of her best friend, Jennifer Papula, who is only too happy to share the town's most recent juicy gossip. For one thing, there's Jerry Ray Turner, the town's best mechanic, who came out of the closet as a cross-dresser. And then there's crazy old Ollie Griffin, still living inside his '69 Thunderbird and occasionally showering in the park's fountain. But the biggest uproar is Roy Bob Benson, who is trying to buy the old Hacker's Jewelry building and turn it into a "girly" bar. That's just the beginning of the news, and as Molly tries to help the newly formed revitalization committee think of a way to stop Roy Bob, a vandal threatens the town's sense of security. Who is doing this and why? Full of wit, intrigue, and a cast of memorable characters, The Hillbilly Debutante Café is sure to keep you coming back time and time again!




The Hillbilly Debutante Mercantile & Pie Shoppe


Book Description

Chaos once again reigns supreme as the zany cast of characters from 'The Hillbilly Debutante Cafe' return for the second and final chapter of the series. The regulars at the Hillbilly Debutante Cafe are none too happy when owner Molly McCarty decides to change the cafe to a mercantile and pie shoppe. Struggles in her own personal life which threaten her lifelong friendship with Jennifer, are exacerbated when ex-mayor Roland Thurman is released from prison. Out on 'good behavior' for trying to kill Molly a few years earlier, Molly suspects that Roland hasn't changed a bit. and soon discovers he is up to his old tricks. When one of their own is found brutally murdered in the mercantile everyone - including Roland - is a suspect. But the plot takes a quick turn when a prominent figure and someone close to the victim is arrested. With all the lovable characters (and a few new ones), resident ghost Ashley Hunter returns as narrator for this cozy mystery 'The Hillbilly Debutante Mercantile and Pie Shoppe'. This is Kathie (Pixie) Truitt's third novel, and the sequel to 'The Hillbilly Debutante Cafe.' When she's not writing she loves to travel and divides her time between Dallas, Texas and Alexandria, Virginia.




False Victim


Book Description

Julie Patterson is a former Miss Mississippi with a successful husband, two wonderful children, and the lavish life that many can only dream about. Her life becomes even better when her husband receives a long-awaited promotion and the family moves to a neighborhood near Washington DC. Julie quickly makes friends with neighbors, except for the woman who lives behind her, who simply stares without acknowledgment of Julie. After a while, though, the woman, Lynn, warms up to Julie, and the two form a fast friendship. But this friendship quickly turns strange as Julie learns of Lynn's propensity to lie for attention. She and her family also notice that Lynn has gotten the same car as Julie, has begun to dress like Julie, is getting a pool just like Julie, and is consistently attempting to one-up Julie. At first everyone brushes it off, but when one lie threatens Julie's family, she begins to realize Lynn has some unknown agenda, and Julie is her target. No one else takes it seriously, and many neighbors side with Lynn, even as the situation begins to spiral out of control, until one is found on the stand for attempted murder. Is Lynn a False Victim, or could Julie be guilty? Is there an end to the madness? Will the story end happily? You'll be on the edge of your seat as you await the answers in this gripping, psychological thriller based on a true story.




The Debutante


Book Description

Juliet Sinclair knows her brother was murdered-now if only she could understand why. Proving her family innocent of treason is taking a toll on lady-turned-maid Juliet. Her latest investigation has brought her into the service of the spoiled Miss Dunbar and her salacious older brother, who pursues Juliet despite repeated rebuffs. Complicating matters further is the reappearance of Juliet's former beau who has not yet learned to do without her, and a growing attraction between herself and her brother's witty--and handsome--best friend. Even with these distractions, Juliet begins to piece together the events surrounding her brother's final days--and his connection to a mysterious figure named only as "H." But Juliet's ruse is under threat of revelation, and her blackmailer is one who will not hesitate to burn her unless she gives him what he wants: every document related to her brother's former role as a spy for His Majesty against the French. Follow the continuing adventures of Juliet Sinclair in "The Debutante," Book Two of the Sinclair Society Series.




A Confederacy of Dunces


Book Description

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize “A masterwork . . . the novel astonishes with its inventiveness . . . it is nothing less than a grand comic fugue.”—The New York Times Book Review A Confederacy of Dunces is an American comic masterpiece. John Kennedy Toole's hero, one Ignatius J. Reilly, is "huge, obese, fractious, fastidious, a latter-day Gargantua, a Don Quixote of the French Quarter. His story bursts with wholly original characters, denizens of New Orleans' lower depths, incredibly true-to-life dialogue, and the zaniest series of high and low comic adventures" (Henry Kisor, Chicago Sun-Times).




Raise Your Vibes!


Book Description

A fun and super-practical guide to getting healthier and happier by tapping into the incredible power of energy healing. The author is a qualified Reiki Master with a mission to make the healing power of Reiki, and energy healing in general, accessible to all. Fun and easy to use, this book enables everyone to take advantage of the healing and empowering energies gifted to us by the Universe, and to take their wellbeing into their own hands. Reiki Master Athena Bahri has developed an approach to energy self-healing that combines simple Reiki techniques that anyone can use with a range of different healing modalities, from crystals to lunar rituals. The book is aimed at all those people who are looking for ways of improving their lives that aren't too complicated and can be done without spending time and money on expensive courses. It includes a straightforward process of Reiki self-attunement that will enable readers to access the simple Reiki healing powers and combine these with the other techniques described. The emphasis is on empowering readers to use these tools to create a vibration-raising practice of their own, that they can then use in a range of different situations, from dealing with physical pain to ridding themselves of stress and lingering emotional upset to improving the vibes of their surroundings at work and at home.




The Beauty of What Remains


Book Description

The national bestseller From the author of the bestselling More Beautiful Than Before comes an inspiring book about loss based on his most popular sermon. As the senior rabbi of one of the largest synagogues in the world, Steve Leder has learned over and over again the many ways death teaches us how to live and love more deeply by showing us not only what is gone but also the beauty of what remains. This inspiring and comforting book takes us on a journey through the experience of loss that is fundamental to everyone. Yet even after having sat beside thousands of deathbeds, Steve Leder the rabbi was not fully prepared for the loss of his own father. It was only then that Steve Leder the son truly learned how loss makes life beautiful by giving it meaning and touching us with love that we had not felt before. Enriched by Rabbi Leder's irreverence, vulnerability, and wicked sense of humor, this heartfelt narrative is filled with laughter and tears, the wisdom of millennia and modernity, and, most of all, an unfolding of the profound and simple truth that in loss we gain more than we ever imagined.




The Snowball


Book Description

Shortlisted for the Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Prize 2008 The Snowball is the first and will be the only biography of the world's richest man, Warren Buffett, written with his full cooperation and collaboration. Combining a unique blend of "The Sage of Omaha's" business savvy, life story and philosophy, The Snowball is essential reading for anyone wishing to discover and replicate the secrets of his business and life success. Warren Buffett is arguably the world's greatest investor. Even as a child he was fascinated by the concept of risk and probability, setting up his first business at the age of six. In 1964 he bought struggling Massachusetts textile firm Berkshire Hathaway and grew it to be the 12th largest corporation in the US purely through the exercise of sound investing principles - a feat never equalled in the annals of business. Despite an estimated net worth of around US$62 billion, Buffett leads an intriguingly frugal life taking home a salary of only £50,000 a year. His only indulgence is a private jet, an extravagance he wryly acknowledges by calling it "The Indefensible". In 2006, he made the largest charitable donation on record, with most of it going to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The Snowball provides a comprehensive, richly detailed insight one of the world's most extraordinary and much loved public figures.







Morality in Cormac McCarthy's Fiction


Book Description

This book argues that McCarthy’s works convey a profound moral vision, and use intertextuality, moral philosophy, and questions of genre to advance that vision. It focuses upon the ways in which McCarthy’s fiction is in ceaseless conversation with literary and philosophical tradition, examining McCarthy’s investment in influential thinkers from Marcus Aurelius to Hannah Arendt, and poets, playwrights, and novelists from Dante and Shakespeare to Fyodor Dostoevsky and Antonio Machado. The book shows how McCarthy’s fiction grapples with abiding moral and metaphysical issues: the nature and problem of evil; the idea of God or the transcendent; the credibility of heroism in the modern age; the question of moral choice and action; the possibility of faith, hope, love, and goodness; the meaning and limits of civilization; and the definition of what it is to be human. This study will appeal alike to readers, teachers, and scholars of Cormac McCarthy.