Showing results by publisher "Blackstone Audio, Inc." in Family Life

The scion of a family of wealthy timber barons, David Burkett has grown up with a father who is a malevolent force more than a father and a mother made vague and numb by alcohol and pills. He and his sister Cynthia, a firecracker who scandalizes the family at 14 by taking up with the son of their Finnish-Native American gardener, are mostly left to make their own way.

Growing up in hardscrabble Kentucky in the 1920s, with their mother dead and their stepfather an everpresent threat, Bertie Fischer and her older sister, Mabel, have no one but each other—with perhaps a sweetheart for Bertie waiting in the wings. But on the day that Bertie receives her eighthgrade diploma, good intentions go terribly wrong, setting off a chain of misunderstandings that will send the sisters on separate paths and reverberate through their daughters’ and granddaughters’ lives.

Years of long workdays and little sleep as a political campaigner are about to pay off now that Lucy Toomey's boss is entering the White House. But when her estranged older sister, Alice, unexpectedly dies, Lucy is drawn back to Nilson's Bay, her small, close-knit Wisconsin hometown.

In 1972 on Mudas Summers's 17th birthday, her beloved mama Ella is found hanging from the rafters of their home. Most people in Peckinpaw, Kentucky, assume that Ella's no-good husband did the deed. Others think Ella grew tired of his abuse and did it herself. Muddy is determined to find out for sure either way, especially once she finds strange papers hidden among her mama's possessions

Sometimes a family's deepest silences hide the most important secrets. For Mina, a London-based travel writer, the enigmatic silence surrounding her aunt Carmela has become a personal obsession. Carmela disappeared from her Italian hometown long ago and is mentioned only in fragments and whispers. Mina has resisted prying, respectful of her family's Sardinian reserve. But now, with her mother battling cancer, it's time to learn the truth.

Evelyn is a Creole woman who comes of age in New Orleans at the height of World War II. Her family inhabits the upper echelon of black society, and when she falls for no-name Renard, she is forced to choose between her life of privilege and the man she loves. In 1982, Evelyn's daughter Jackie is a frazzled single mother grappling with her absent husband's drug addiction. Just as she comes to terms with his abandoning the family, he returns, ready to resume their old life.

When Grace Saunders vowed to take her husband for better or worse, she meant every word. She and Jamie are solid, mutually supportive, and certain of their future together. And then, on a hiking trip for their 15th anniversary, an accident leaves Jamie in a coma, unable to move or communicate. As months pass, Grace is in limbo - still married, yet utterly alone and burdened with responsibilities that threaten to sink her. Meeting Nan and Monica, unlikely friends who need Grace almost as much as she needs them, makes life bearable, if not quite happy.

Glass Ferry, Kentucky, is bourbon country. Whiskey has been a way of life for generations, enabling families to provide and survive even in the darkest times. Flannery Butler's daddy, Beauregard "Honey Bee" Butler, entrusted her with his recipes before he passed on, swearing her to secrecy. But Flannery is harboring other secrets too, about her twin sister Patsy, older by eight minutes and pretty in a way Flannery knows she'll never be. Then comes the prom night when Patsy - wearing a yellow chiffon dress and the family pearls - disappears along with her date.

For a group of four New York friends, the past decade has been largely defined by marriage and motherhood. Educated and reared to believe that they would conquer the world, they then left prestigious jobs to stay home with their babies. What was meant to be a temporary leave of absence has lasted a decade. Now, at age 40, with the halcyon days of young motherhood behind them and without professions to define them, Amy, Jill, Roberta, and Karen face a life that is not what they were brought up to expect but seems to be the one they have chosen.

On a blistering day in the 26th year of Augustus Caesar's reign, a young chef, Thrasius, is acquired for the exorbitant price of 20,000 denarii. His purchaser is the infamous gourmet Marcus Gavius Apicius, wealthy beyond measure, obsessed with a taste for fine meals from exotic places and a singular ambition: to serve as culinary adviser to Caesar, an honor that will cement his legacy as Rome's leading epicure.

The toast of Europe, Josephine Evans had spent 30 years abroad establishing her reputation as one of the finest actresses of her generation. In Amsterdam, she redefined who and what an African American diva could be, and her legions of loyal fans loved her for it. But when a war she didn't even understand suddenly makes her the target of angry anti-American protests, Josephine is forced to return to America to see if she can find a new definition of home.

Together they decide to enroll in a training program for nurses - a new option for women of their time who have previously been largely limited to the role of wives, and preferably mothers. As the Latimer sisters become immersed in hospital life and the demands of their training, they meet people and encounter challenges that spark new maturity and independence.

Nestled into the cliffs in southern Italy's Amalfi coast, Positano is an artist's vision, with rows of brightly hued houses perched above the sea and picturesque staircases meandering up and down the hillside. Santina, still a striking woman despite old age and the illness that saps her last strength, is spending her final days at her home, Villa San Vito. The magnificent 18th-century palazzo is very different from the tiny house in which she grew up. And as she decides its fate, she must confront the choices that led her here so long ago.

Set in a middle-class neighborhood in Atlanta in the 1980s, Silver Sparrow revolves around James Witherspoon's two families - the public one and the secret one. When the daughters from each family meet and form a friendship, only one of them knows they are sisters. It is a relationship destined to explode when secrets are revealed and illusions shattered. As Jones explores the backstories of her rich yet flawed characters - the father, the two mothers, the grandmother, and the uncle - she also reveals the joy, as well as the destruction, they brought to one another's lives.

Told through the eyes of Tish, a 19-year-old girl in love with Fonny, a young sculptor who is the father of her child, Baldwin's story mixes the sweet and the sad. Tish and Fonny have pledged to get married, but Fonny is falsely accused of a terrible crime and is imprisoned. Their families set out to clear his name, and as they face an uncertain future, the young lovers experience a kaleidoscope of emotions - affection, despair, and hope.

While New Bern, Connecticut, lies under a blanket of snow, Cobbled Court Quilts remains a cozy haven for its owner, Evelyn Dixon, and her friends. Evelyn relishes winter’s slower pace—besides, Internet sales are hopping, thanks to her son Garrett’s efforts. In addition to helping out at the shop, Garrett has also been patiently waiting for his girlfriend, Liza, to finish art school in New York City.

Some twins communicate in a secret language all their own. For Whiskey and Charlie Ferns, the two-way alphabet (alpha, bravo, charlie, delta) whispered back and forth over their crackly walkie-talkies is the best they can do. But as the brothers grow up, they grow apart. Whiskey is everything Charlie is not - bold, daring, carefree - and Charlie blames his brother for always stealing the limelight, always striving ahead while seeming to push Charlie back.

Grace Bradshaw knows the exact minute she will die. On death row for murdering her infant son, her last breath will be taken on February 15 at 12:01 a.m. Eleven years, five months, and 27 days separate her from the last time she heard her precious daughter's voice and the final moment she'd heard anyone call her mom. Out of appeals, she can focus on only one thing - reconnecting with her daughter and making sure she knows the truth.

The Turners have lived on Yarrow Street for over 50 years. Their house has seen 13 children grown and gone - and some returned; it has seen the arrival of grandchildren, the fall of Detroit's East Side, and the loss of a father. The house still stands despite abandoned lots, an embattled city, and the inevitable shift outward to the suburbs. But now, as ailing matriarch Viola finds herself forced to leave her home and move in with her eldest son, the family discovers that the house is worth just a 10th of its mortgage.

Two months after the suspicious and much-publicized death of his father on the island of Martha's Vineyard, it is taking all of Adam Blaine's will to suture the deep wounds the tragedy has inflicted upon his family and himself. As the court inquest into Benjamin Blaine's death casts suspicions on those closest to him, Adam struggles to protect them from those who still suspect that his father was murdered by one of his kin.