Showing results by narrator "Allyson Ryan" in All Categories

Edith Widder grew up determined to become a marine biologist. But after complications from a surgery during college caused her to go temporarily blind, she became fascinated by light as well as the power of optimism. Below the Edge of Darkness explores the depths of the planet's oceans as Widder seeks to understand bioluminescence, one of the most important and widely used forms of communication in nature.

Welcome to the neighbourhood. We do things differently here. Nora Spangler is a successful lawyer, but when it comes to domestic life, she's always the one doing more. She packs her daughter's lunches, schedules the doctor appointments, knows where the extra paper towel rolls are and buys the birthday cards. Her husband, Hayden, works hard, too...but why is she always working so much harder?

Once-rising literary star Olivia Fitzgerald is in a downward spiral. After her second novel, a retelling of Rebecca, fails, her third novel can’t find a publisher. And Olivia's boyfriend breaking up with her hasn’t helped her creativity much either. Broke, newly single and struggling to write another book, she jumps at the chance for a high-paying ghostwriting job when her agent calls with the opportunity.

Biographer and acclaimed historian Charlotte Gray breathes new life into Sara and Jennie, two famous women whose sons, Winston Churchill and Franklin D Roosevelt, would change the course of the 20th century. Impeccably researched and filled with intriguing social insights, Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons offers a fascinating and fulsome portrait of how leaders are not just born but made.

On two remote islands off the coast of Maine, the local lobstermen have fought savagely for generations over the fishing rights to the ocean waters between them. Young Ruth Thomas is born into this feud, the daughter of one of the greediest lobstermen in Maine. Eighteen years old, as smart as a whip and irredeemably unromantic, Ruth returns home from boarding school determined to throw her education overboard and join the 'stern men'.

Back at dinner, somebody said that the goose thinks it’s a dog. No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t think it’s a dog. The goose doesn’t think. The goose just is. And what the goose is is goose. But goose is not goose, Robert thinks. Even the goose isn’t goose. In Good Trouble, the first story collection from Joseph O’Neil, author of Netherland, characters are forced to discover exactly who they are - and who they can never quite be.

They thought she was the victim, but they're the ones in danger.... Imagine a helpless, pregnant 16-year-old who's just been yanked from the serenity of her home and shoved into a dirty van. Kidnapped.... Alone.... Terrified. Now forget her.... Picture instead a pregnant, 16-year-old, manipulative prodigy. She is shoved into a dirty van and, from the first moment of her kidnapping, feels a calm desire for two things: to save her unborn son and to exact merciless revenge.

Step back into the 1950s, where in the town of Wooster, Ohio, the switchboard operators indulge in a forbidden treat: eavesdropping on phone calls. Vivian follows the rules, for the most part, but she enjoys the gossip as much as her colleagues do. Until one day it's about her. And the secret she hears turns her world upside down. Beneath its friendly surface, Wooster is simmering with secrets and scandal, while harsh, unspoken rules on class and race set invisible boundaries.

Nightmares still haunt Chloe 13 years after she lost her baby sister. Her mother, Jules, with a busy tech career and long history of chronic pain, has little time for Chloe. After Chloe drops out of university to travel for a year, Jules’s OxyContin dependency quickly becomes a problem. Aftershock follows their parallel journeys: Jules struggles to regain control of her life and come to terms with the emotional pain that has so long manifested itself in her body. Chloe, after a rocky visit with her estranged father in New Zealand, resolves to go off the map....

Fifty-something Dan is struggling to cope with a mid-life career change. MBA-educated wife and mother Jen has dealt with life’s disappointments by becoming a closet alcoholic. Seventeen-year-old Chloe is obsessing about getting into the right university and her state tennis semifinals. Fourteen-year-old Max is trying to figure out when he can next sneak a puff on his beloved vape and plotting revenge on the school bully.