Showing results by author "Donna Ball" in All Categories

Aggie Malone is a dedicated young cop who has spent her entire life just looking for a place to call home. She never thought she'd find it in a quaint Florida village called Dogleg Island, where almost nothing ever happens. Deputy Ryan Grady is an easygoing playboy who carries a surf board in the trunk of his patrol car and lives in the same rambling beach cottage his grandfather built 70 years ago. He grew up on Dogleg Island and can't imagine ever living anywhere else. It's always been the most peaceful place he has ever known.

It's Christmas Eve, and Cici, Bridget and Lindsay are busy preparing for their annual holiday party. The tree is sparkling, the turkey is roasting, the stockings are hung and the eggnog is chilled. The scene is set for the perfect Christmas...with one or two exceptions. The entire state is in the midst of a heat wave. No one can find any mistletoe. The Christmas tree lights keep exploding, and, perhaps worst of all, something has gone terribly wrong with Ida Mae's fruitcakes.

On foot, on horseback, in covered wagons and mule carts they came, traversing treacherous rivers and wild plains in search of the Promised Land, drawn ever westward by the promise of the new American frontier. Katherine Carlyle, a desperate woman with a violent past, leaves behind the graves of her family and the only home she has ever known in search of a new life. An unwanted passenger on a westward bound flatboat, she is forced into the role of hero when catastrophe strikes...

Though still adjusting to a new job, a new town, and a new family, Buck is acutely aware that the probationary period specified by his contract with the City of Mercy is almost up. His relationship with the mayor has never been ideal, and he knows he could be fired at any time. It therefore seems imprudent to refuse when the mayor asks him to do a favor for an old friend and political ally, Jarrod Whitley.

Raine's old boyfriend Andy Fontana is back in town...and at the top of the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List. With a fortune in diamonds hidden somewhere in the wilderness, several recent acts of eco-terrorism and an unsolved murder laid at Andy's door, the feds turn to Raine Stockton, with her unsurpassed knowledge of the mountains and her reputation as a wilderness tracker, to help bring Andy to justice. The only problem is that Raine still believes Andy is innocent...

Former Hanover County Sheriff Buck Lawson leaves the mountains of North Carolina to take a job as the police chief of the small South Georgia town of Mercy, and soon finds himself in over his head. For one thing, his predecessor has been murdered...Buck has inherited an unsolved homicide, a house that may well be haunted, and a police department that is almost certainly corrupt. It falls to Buck to free an innocent man and bring the former police chief’s killer to justice while wading through the quagmire of incompetence and dishonesty that permeates his office.

Come sit on the porch a spell. Let's talk about times gone by and folks we remember, about slow summer evenings and lightning bugs in a jar. Listen to the music of a creaky swing and hand-cranked ice cream and cicadas chorusing in the sultry night air. Let's talk about how things used to be in the South - and for some of us, they way they still are. Welcome to the world of Sweet Tea and Jesus Shoes, where award winning authors Deborah Smith, Sandra Chastain, Virginia Ellis, Debra Dixon, Donna Ball and Nancy Knight come together for the first time to create this poignant, humorous collection of nostalgic tales.

Paul and Derrick have hit their stride with the Hummingbird House Bed and Breakfast, a destination in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley. Guests come from all over the country to enjoy their Christmas weekend extravaganza. Of course there are a few glitches: 20 Christmas trees to be decorated in less than a week, an absentee massage therapist, and - perhaps most distressing of all - the unexpected presence of three school-age children, courtesy of their saucy young housekeeper Purline.

The annual Hansonville, North Carolina Founder’s Day Festival it’s a perfect opportunity to raise money for the local animal shelter for Raine Stockton...but when a stranger wanders into her fund-raising booth, the peaceful country afternoon is turned into chaos.... When the unthinkable happens and an innocent life is placed in jeopardy, Raine is forced to make a terrible choice: one that will shake her to her very core and cause her to question not only herself, but everything she has ever believed.

For dog trainer and search-and-rescue volunteer Raine Stockton, the last few months have been marked by murder, danger, and betrayal. A luxury vacation to the Caribbean resort island of St. Bart's sounds like the perfect antidote for stress, particularly since it includes three of her favorite traveling companions: her boyfriend, Miles; his daughter, Melanie; and Raine's happy-go-lucky golden retriever, Cisco. But even in paradise, trouble finds them.

Dogleg Island Police Chief Aggie Malone has spent years searching for the identity of her birth father. Now, thanks to a home DNA test, she has a lead...but it’s taking her in a direction she never could have imagined, and desperately does not want to go. Because the evidence suggests that Aggie could be the daughter of the infamous Angelo, head of the deadly Ghost Syndicate crime empire. Matters become more complicated when Aggie’s canine partner, Flash, discovers an abandoned child on the beach.

The name Stockton has always carried weight in the small Smokey Mountain community of Hanover County, North Carolina, and Judge Jonathon Stockton was one of the most respected men in the county… until a scandal was uncovered that destroyed his legacy and shook his daughter, Raine, to the very foundation of her being. Now her father’s misdeeds are once again threatening to upend Raine’s world, this time in the form of a relative she never knew she had.

Still recovering from the traumatic events of the past year, newlyweds Aggie Malone, police chief of Dogleg Island, and Deputy Sheriff Ryan Grady are looking forward to a casual day trip to Wild Horse Island, a nearby nature preserve, with their precocious - and uncannily perceptive - border collie, Flash. But when Flash discovers a body in a shallow grave on the island, and Aggie and Ryan learn of an attack on the park ranger, a tangled knot of conspiracy, murder and deception begins to unfold.

No one knows the mountains of North Carolina like Raine Stockton and her search and rescue dog, Cisco. When they are called in to search for an elderly man who has wandered away from home, it seems like a routine mission until Raine looks through her binoculars and sees something she wasn't supposed to see. A dead man is very much alive, a felon is walking around free, and Raine is the only person who can testify to the fact. The problem is that no one takes her claims seriously...except the person who wants her dead.

It's Christmas time, and for Raine Stockton and her Search and Rescue dog, Cisco, Hansonville, North Carolina is just like a Norman Rockwell painting - except for the rash of thefts of baby Jesus figurines from nativity scenes, an abandoned box of golden retriever puppies that someone leaves beside her mailbox, and a mysterious gift from one of Cisco's a grateful admirers. Raine already has her hands full with her own misbehaving pooches, unexpected house guests, and a complicated new relationship.

Times are hard in the small Smoky Mountain town of Hansonville, North Carolina, and for former forest service employee Raine Stockton this Christmas will be harder than most as she prepares to spend her first holiday without her family, without a job... and without a dog. When a mysterious Secret Santa starts making dreams come true all over the county everyone's spirits are on the rise, but Raine can't help but wonder whether there is more to this enigmatic philanthropist than meets the eye.

January is known as the dead season in the small Smoky mountain community of Hanover County, North Carolina. For dog trainer and wilderness expert Raine Stockton, who hasn't had a client in six month, this season has been deader than most.

Dog trainer Raine Stockton has lived all her life in the quiet community of Hansonville, North Carolina. She is the daughter of a judge, the niece of a sheriff, and the ex-wife of a deputy. She does not lead the kind of life, generally speaking, in which people get buried in her backyard. But when Cisco, Raine's mischievous golden retriever, digs up human bones beneath the site of what will soon be her new training kennel, mayhem ensues.

Police Chief Aggie Malone is facing her first Christmas as a married woman, and hoping for a relatively uneventful holiday in the quiet Gulf Coast community of Dogleg Island where she, along with her perspicacious border collie Flash, is in charge of keeping the peace. She is still trying to find her place in the big, boisterous Grady family, but unlike Flash - and her own husband, Deputy Sheriff Ryan Grady - Aggie does not see the appeal of the holiday, and the magic of the season is completely lost on her. The old-fashioned Christmas Grady has planned for his bride begins to unravel when Aggie's investigation into a homicide hit-and-run leads to the arrest of her own brother-in-law and exposes a crime syndicate that's responsible for spreading millions in counterfeit bills throughout the southeast.

Wilderness expert and dog trainer Raine Stockton agrees to help lead a survival skills training camp for her fiancés executive team. She is unaware that she and her tracking dog, Cisco, are walking into a hotbed of corporate intrigue involving espionage and stolen technology. Everyone at the retreat is a suspect, and no one can be trusted. And none of them is aware that, while their small drama plays out, a much bigger threat is stalking them.