This is an audiobook of short stories of everyday human emotional experiences. Stories of profound loss, of great friendships, of growing old with a dog, of going to war, and of course, stories of deep romantic love. I hope the stories encourage the listener to do some introspection on what it means to be human. I believe the poems, like all art, will mean more to some than to others.

Disillusioned journalist Tom Langdon must get from Washington to L.A. in time for Christmas. Forced to take the train across the country because of a slight "misunderstanding" at airport security, he begins a journey of self-discovery and rude awakenings, mysterious goings-on and thrilling adventures, screwball escapades and holiday magic.

For DEA Special Agent Marshall Everett, life as he knows it is over once a gunshot wound renders his arm useless. Barred forever from the undercover work he loves, he has nothing - no close friends, no family, no hometown or base, and no desire to settle for life behind a desk. He's called to action in the most unlikely of places when he stumbles upon a beautiful girl burying an old steel box in a Parisian park.

On the surface, these seven women are as different as can be - but each has had her share of bad luck, from cheating husbands to sexist colleagues to a legal system that often doesn't do its job. Now, drawn together by tragedy, they're forging a bond that will help them right the wrongs committed against them and discover an inner strength they didn't know they had. The Sisterhood is learning that when bad things happen, you can roll over and play dead...or you can get up fighting...

You are so young. You may wonder what an old man like me could teach? I wonder as well. I certainly don't claim to know all the answers. I'm barely figuring out the questions...Life has a strange way of repeating itself and I want my experience to help you...My hope is that you'll consider my words and remember my heart.

Back from the Cold War, intelligence officer Keith Landry returns to his hometown of Spencerville, Ohio. Twenty-five years after their last encounter, Keith runs into his first love, Annie, now unhappily married to the town's chief of police--an abusive alcoholic. In his efforts to reclaim Annie, Keith will have to draw on all the skills of a violent lifetime.

As children in foster care, Cecilia and Robin vowed they would be the sisters they had never had. Cecelia, now a superstar singer-songwriter, is living life on the edge. Robin set aside her career as a successful photojournalist to create the loving family she always yearned for. But gazing through a wide-angle lens at both past and future, she sees that her marriage is disintegrating. Her attorney husband is rarely home. She and the children need Kris' love and attention, but does Kris need them?

"Do what the other fella can't. Be what the other fella ain't. And then help the other fella." Joe Hart has never let go of his uncle's words. An orphan from the unspoiled Adirondack Mountains, Joe leaves his humble beginnings and goes on to distinguish himself, first as a navy submarine commander, then as an attorney unequaled in his field. But Joe's world crashes with an unexpected tragedy.

What would you do if you lost everything - your job, your home, and the love of your life - all at the same time? When it happens to Seattle ad executive Alan Christoffersen, he's tempted by his darkest thoughts. A bottle of pills in his hand and nothing left to live for, he plans to end his misery. Instead, he decides to take a walk. But not any ordinary walk. Taking with him only the barest of essentials, Al leaves behind all that he's known and heads for the farthest point on his map.

After three years, Sarah Jarret struggles every day with the death of her long-time partner. Sarah may finally be beginning to get herself back together. Her small custom furniture building business is showing real potential, and Jessica Whitney, a beautiful and successful architect, just walked into her life. Jessica and Sarah are immediately attracted to each other, and they fall fast and hard, but Sarah's guilt and pride may push Jessica away and keep Sarah from opening up to the possibility of new love.

Thirteen stories that are just right for a lunch time read. All stories stand alone, and are complete in this volume.

In 1972, the town of DeClare, Oklahoma, was consumed by the terrifying murder of Gaylene Harjo and the disappearance of her baby, Nicky Jack. When the child's pajama bottoms were found on the banks of Willow Creek, everyone feared Nicky Jack was dead, although his body was never found.

A cop lies dying beneath the blistering Arizona sun - a local lawman who may well have become the next sheriff of Cochise County. The police brass claim that Andy Brady was dirty, and that his shooting was a suicide attempt. Joanna Brady, his devoted wife and mother of their nine-year-old daughter, knows a cover-up when she hears one...and murder when she sees it.

Marnie is just 35 when her boyfriend, Brian, drops dead of a sudden heart attack. Stunned by his death, Marnie finds her greatest grief is for Troy, Brian’s son whom she has raised as her own since he was a kindergartener. When he is reclaimed by his train wreck of a birth mother, Troy’s departure drives Marnie to a grief group at the local rec center. There she finds unexpected allies, three strangers who join her in an impulsive road trip from Wisconsin to Las Vegas to reconnect with Troy.

Having garnered three RITA Awards, New York Times best-selling author Jodi Thomas is one of several Texans inducted into the RWA Hall of Fame. Assuming someone else’s identity, a 16-year-old flees to Harmony, Texas. There she keeps her distance from the welcoming townsfolk. But when prairie fires threaten the small town, she learns the true meaning of family, friendship, and home.

Ex-DEA agent Jesse Warden has seen enough of the inside of a solitary confinement cell to last him a lifetime. Or two lifetimes, which is the sentence he's serving after being convicted of a crime he was planning to commit but never did. So when an old buddy shows up with a deal that could spring him from his hell behind bars, he's ready to listen.

A brutal, psychopathic murderer is released from prison - and stalks his prey with intent to kill.

For DEA Special Agent Marshall Everett, life as he knows it is over once a gunshot wound renders his arm useless. Barred forever from the undercover work he loves, he has nothing - no close friends, no family, no hometown or base, and no desire to settle for life behind a desk. He's called to action in the most unlikely of places when he stumbles upon a beautiful girl burying an old steel box in a Parisian park.

Vida is only 19, but she knows a lot about dying. Her weak heart has kept her on the edge of death her whole life. It hasn't been much of a life. Thanks to her overprotective mother, Vida's only friend is Esther, an elderly Holocaust survivor who lives upstairs. Vida's heart is finally about to give out unless she can get a donor heart in time. Richard is 36 and blissfully married until he gets the call that his beloved wife has died in a car accident. His world falls to pieces.

At age fifty, Margaret Spencer's empty nest and empty marriage prompt her to answer an ad for part-time office work at the office of private investigator Nat Southby. Suddenly, she is deep in the most unlikely of adventures for a woman in 1950s Vancouver, helping him with a case of missing young women involved in a shady business ring. Maggie finds unexpected freedom as a developing detective and along the way she uncovers evil in the quaintly urban setting.

For the past 33 years, Angela Gillespie has sent to friends and family around the world an end-of-the-year letter titled ‘Hello from the Gillespies’. It’s always been cheery and full of good news. This year, Angela surprises herself - she tells the truth....

With a heart full of dreams, Sallie Coleman leaves Texas and heads west determined to get as far from the squalor of her dirt poor beginnings. With its shifting sands, smoky saloons, and bingo palaces, Las Vegas seems like a paradise. A paradise where an extraordinary twist of fate makes Sallie the most powerful businesswoman in Nevada.

Los Angeles greeting-card artist Wollie Shelley is dating 40 men in 60 days as research for a radio talk show host's upcoming book. Wollie is meeting plenty of eligible bachelors but not falling in love, not until she stumbles over a dead body en route to Rio Pescado - a state-run mental hospital - and is taken hostage by a charismatic "doctor" who is on the run from the Mob.

With unparalleled honesty, Dyan Cannon shares the heartwarming and heartbreaking story of her magical romance and stormy marriage to screen legend Cary Grant.He was the ultimate star, defining Hollywood glamour as well as cinematic achievement. She was a bright new actress, beautiful and funny, who would one day prove her talent by being the first woman to receive Academy Award nominations for her work on-screen and behind the camera. When he asked to meet Dyan, she assumed it was for an acting part, but he had a different role in mind for her....

After a near-fatal head injury, Navy SEAL lieutenant Tom Paoletti catches a glimpse of an international terrorist in his New England hometown. When he calls for help, the Navy dismisses the sighting as injury-induced imaginings. In a last-ditch effort to prevent disaster, Tom creates his own makeshift counterterrorism team, assembling his most loyal officers, two elderly war veterans, a couple of misfit teenagers, and Dr. Kelly Ashton.

Celebrity Charles James can't shake the nightmare that wakes him each night. He sees himself walking down a long, broken highway, the sides of which are lit in flames. Where is he going? Why is he walking? What is the wailing he hears around him? By day he wonders why he's so haunted and unhappy when he has all he ever wanted - fame, fans, and fortune and the lavish lifestyle it affords him. Coming from a childhood of poverty and pain, this is what he's dreamed of. But now, at the pinnacle of his career, he's started to wonder if he's wanted the wrong things.

Everyone is always telling Stone Barrington that he’s too smart to be a cop, but it’s pure luck that places him on the streets in the dead of night, just in time to witness the horrifying incident that turns his life inside out. Suddenly he is on the front page of every New York newspaper and his life is hopelessly entwined in the increasingly shocking life (and perhaps death) of Sasha Nijinsky, the country’s hottest and most beautiful television anchorwoman.

Smashed skull, snapped ribs, and a cloying smell of carrion. Leave the body for the hyenas to devour - no body, no case. But when Kalahari game rangers stumble on a human corpse midmeal, it turns out the murder wasn't perfect after all. Enough evidence is left to suggest foul play. Detective David "Kubu" Bengu of the Botswana Criminal Investigation Department is assigned to the case.

In her best-selling memoir North of Normal, Cea wrote with grace about her unconventional childhood - her early years living in a tipi in Alberta with her pot-smoking, free-loving counterculture family. But her struggles do not end when she leaves her family at the age of 13 to become a model. Honest and daring, Nearly Normal reveals the many ways that Cea's unconventional childhood continues to reverberate through the years.

In the still shadows of the confessional, a madman tauntingly reveals his plan for a murder he is going to commit, pulling Father Thomas Madden into a twisted game by disclosing his next intended victim: Tom's sister, Laurant. In a frantic race to protect her, Tom calls upon his best friend, elite FBI agent Nick Buchanan, to track the predator who is closing in on Laurant. Now, as an electrifying attraction grows between Laurant and Nick, so does the danger - and one false move will cost both of them everything that matters.