Early Fiction

In the winter of 1846, the Donner Party was stranded by heavy snows in the Sierra Nevada mountains. The pioneers endured bitter hardships and many of them died. But some survived, including eight-year-old Patty Reed, a girl filled with dignity and determination in the face of mortal danger. This is her story, as told by Dolly, the wooden doll she kept hidden in her dress.

As did his father before him, Pierce Butler treats his plantation slaves like family. But massive gambling debts force him to sell 429 “family” members. When the auction begins, torrential rain falls - not stopping until the final slave is sold the next day. The ominous rainfall prompts these words: “This ain’t rain. This is God’s tears.” Based on the largest slave auction in U.S. history, this poignant montage is the fictionalized account of that 1859 Georgia tragedy.

A young and ambitious writer named Jerome David Salinger set his goals very high very early in his career. He almost desperately wished to publish his early stories in The New Yorker magazine, the pinnacle, he felt, of America’s literary world. But such was not to be for several long years and the length of one long world war. But other magazines were quick to recognize a new talent, a fresh voice at a time when the world verged on madness....

Vril, the Power of the Coming Race (1870) by Edward Bulwer-Lytton is an early science fiction novel. The setting is a strange subterranean world inhabited by beautiful entities that resemble the angels described in scripture. The advanced beings known as Vril-ya live underground - using the mysterious "Vril" as an energy source - but intend to reclaim the surface of the earth as their own. The narrator ends up deep inside the Earth via a natural chasm in a mine shaft.

While the snow swirls outdoors and the fire crackles in the hearth, Mr. Putter decides to write a mystery book. But he soon learns that writing isn't as easy as he thought it would be.

In 1938, two men held history in their hands. One was Adolf Hitler. The other was British prime minister Neville Chamberlain, who, determined to avoid war at any cost, came to be known as "the great appeaser". But Harry Turtledove, the unrivaled master of alternate history, has launched a gripping saga that springboards from a different fateful act: What if Chamberlain had stood up to Hitler? How would the war have unfolded and changed our world?

Centered around an obscure group of malcontents intent on creating a terrible explosion in New York City in 1993, Fear City shows the final stages of young Jack becoming Repairman Jack. It is a dark and terrible story, full of plots and needless mayhem, with secret agents, a freelance torturer, a secret society as old as human history, love, death, and a very bleak triumph.

Follow the adventures of Wiggly Worm and his best friends (Snarky Snail, Rattles Snake, and Munchy Mosquito). Wiggly and his friends live in a backyard garden. What happens when they decide to explore outside the yard? This is an excellent storybook for early listeners as a bedtime story.

“Can I save my daughter . . . and them?” Time traveler Tom Cook has settled into his prehistoric life among the Neanderthals, but it’s not without its challenges that include a burning desire to see his future-dwelling daughter, Pook, again. When a growing threat from hostile neighbors turns into an attack, an old contact from another world comes to the rescue and leads both Tom and his Neanderthal wife, Brassy, back to that future through an increasingly unstable time portal. Now, after traveling to and from two different worlds, Tom must find a way to defeat his enemies in both, ...

A Karin Slaughter Will Trent thriller collection featuring Fallen, Criminal, and Unseen

There was always something slightly dangerous about Joan. So, when she turns up at private inves­tigator Henry Kimball’s office asking him to investigate her husband, he can’t help feeling ill at ease. Just the sight of her stirs up a chilling memory: He knew Joan in his previous life as a high school English teacher, when he was at the center of a tragedy.

Nine years old, Andy embarks on the trip by bus, alone for the first time. He decides it will be a rite of passage and his first step into manhood. Sometimes a handful at home, Andy was a good boy when visiting his Grandparents' houses, and he looked forward to the little spoiling certain to come his way.

♥ Wheel Power ♥ Little Wheely rolled round and round, all on his own he spun on the ground. Wheels had a purpose, except for him, which is why he felt sad and so grim. ◆ All his friends were wheels too, yet they all had something to do. He watched them roll all night and day, all very busy – rushing on their way.

She calls herself Hope Miller, but she has no idea who she actually is. Fifteen years ago, she was found in a small New Jersey town thrown from an overturned vehicle, with no clue to her identity. Doctors assumed her amnesia was a temporary side effect of her injuries, but she never regained her memory. Hope eventually started a new life with a new name in a new town that welcomed her, yet always wondered what she may have left behind—or been running from. Now, she’s leaving New Jersey to start over once again.

Bill Martin Jr and Eric Carle's classic Bear books have been a hit with children for many generations and have sold more than 11 million copies. This wonderful compilation brings together the beloved first three Bear books—Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?; Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear?; and Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See?—and includes the newest addition, Baby Bear, Baby Bear, What Do You See?

A horror novel set in Meirion, Wales, during the summer of 1915. As the world teeters on the brink of destruction in 1915, Meirion, a quiet district in Wales, finds itself gripped by a wave of terror. Amid the chaos of World War I, the town’s residents confront an inexplicable horror as nature itself seems to rise against humanity. With a series of grisly deaths igniting panic and superstition, the chilling question looms—what truly lies beneath the madness? The fabric of the community begins to fray as the death toll rises, starting with a missing child, then escalates to a horrific ...

A historical fiction book set in Baltimore during the early 19th century. Baltimore 1812 offers readers a captivating journey into the heart of America's early struggles during the War of 1812. Through the intimate and personal lens of young Lettice Mayfield, experience the highs and lows of life in Baltimore when patriotism, love, and familial bonds are tested like never before. As the narrative unfolds on a lively June evening in 1812, Lettice eagerly awaits her uncle's return, only to be met with the grave news of British forces capturing American sailors, including a family friend. This...

There is a persistent and incorrect idea, reinforced by countless film misrepresentations, that Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson were always staid and dull British chaps of middle years (or older), with Holmes a spry, cranky, and impatient eccentric, and Watson a white-haired and portly Boobus Brittanicus, a la Nigel Bruce. Students of the true and Canonical Sherlock Holmes know this to be a falsehood.

Originally a novella in The Backcountry Brides Collection The daughter of a fur trader, Laurette Pettigrew grew up in the northern frontier. Hers is a lonely existence avoiding the British in the fort and the French voyagers who populate the area in the summer months. The local Ojibwe are her only friends. Sickly and weak, Henry Bedlow arrives at Fort Michilimackinac against his will. He wears the red coat and shoulders a musket, but in his heart, he isn't a soldier. But his choices were to join the army or prison. Their chance meeting changes everything. Will a deadly clash of cultures ...

David Fisher pushes paper for the EPA in a world that's a lot like ours...only different. In this California - and throughout the alternate United States - all gods are real, science doesn't exist, and magic rules everything, running imp-driven computers and creating anxiety-inducing bumper-to-bumper flying-carpet rush hours. Unfortunately, unchecked magic use can leave dangerous residues, creating hours of mind-numbing deskwork for David and his fellow bureaucrats at the Environmental Perfection Agency.