Showing results by narrator "Vanessa Daniels" in All Categories

Motherhood is the toughest - and funniest - job you'll ever love. Raising kids is hard work. The pay sucks, your boss is a tyrant, and the working conditions are pitiful - you can't even take a bathroom break without being interrupted with another outrageous demand. Hasn't every mother said it before? "I just want to pee alone!" Hear these hysterical essays.

Alara Beatty is still pretty new to this whole psychic gig. She's not used to all the bits and bobbles yet. So, when an uninvited vision of a strange man's murder shoves its way into her dreams one night, she's overcome with emotion. Lost and confused, Alara has no idea what to do. She hopes the police will help her out, but the killers were good—when the man's death comes to light, it looks like a simple accident. Only Alara and her sleuthing sidekick, Aunt Irene, know the truth.

When Jessica Chamberlain's friend Laura takes a wrong turn in a storm, three men trap her in a dark house. The cops blow it off as a misunderstanding, but Laura's husband, Nate, is furious and Jess can't let it go. Pursuing the men nearly gets her arrested, but a link to bones her dog, Luke, finds in a Norfolk backyard confirms her suspicions. The Doyle family is up to no good.

Becoming a mother is a joyful rite of passage, but it can also be overwhelming - physically and emotionally. How can you calm the worries, quiet the guilt, and be present with yourself and your kids? Psychologist and mom Ilyse Dobrow DiMarco specializes in the myriad issues that women with young children struggle with. In this compassionate guide, she shares science-based strategies to help you cope with common challenges and make peace with your transformed identity.

It's no secret that raising two babies at once has its challenges, but with the right preparation you can conquer fears for good. You Can Two! delivers essential information and practical prep strategies to get expecting parents ready for the joys of twinfancy. From mental and emotional prep to feeding, and everything in between, this action-oriented guide covers the broad spectrum of how to tackle the first few months after your babies arrive.

A killer heat wave settles over Seagull Lane...Summer's sizzling in Vista Beach, the home of computer programmer and tole-painting enthusiast Aurora (Rory) Anderson. The abnormally high temperatures are hard on everyone in the quiet Los Angeles county beach community, especially the city's homeless population. Residents are doing everything they can to stay cool, including leaving windows open to catch the faintest breeze. Not the best idea when a string of burglaries is plaguing nearby towns. Still, Rory doesn't expect to find her neighbor's body just a few doors down.

Baker Winnie Johnson does her best work when the heat is on. As owner of the Emergency Dessert Squad, she has a deft touch in the kitchen and a soft spot for lost causes. So when her business professor beau, Jay Morgan, expresses misgivings over having to fail one of his fourth-year students, Winnie cooks up a sweet solution. She'll offer an extra credit opportunity in exchange for a little help with her growing business. But when her protégé's first dessert delivery poisons a student journalist, the publicity threatens to burn Winnie's business to a crisp.

With her rent rising faster than her pie crust, bakery owner Winnie Johnson had hoped to be rescued by an inheritance from her wealthy friend and neighbor Gertrude Redenbacher. Instead all she inherits is the widow's hostile hissing tabby, Lovey, and a vintage ambulance, restored by Gertrude's late husband. As her dream crumbles, Winnie makes her final delivery - a peach pie to an elderly widower. But she finds Bart Wagner lying on his kitchen floor, smothered by a pillow.

After two years of pandemic people are touchy. Violence is everywhere. Fear and anxiety run wild. Jess has a scary encounter with a man in the woods and then a blow-up that threatens her closest friendships. Her husband, FBI Agent Scott Cooper, investigates a school shooting he thinks might be the start of a bigger terrorism campaign.

I lead a safe and snug life in a small desert town, but I have a secret—I have psychic powers that scare me. They've gone wonky before, so now I only use them for the most important purpose—listening to my dogs ask for more treats. But on an awful Monday morning, I stumble right into a vision of my friend's final moments before she's murdered.

Jessica Cooper and her SAR dog Luke are called out to a building collapse. What Luke discovers under the rubble shocks her. Then investigators discover that the explosion was intentional and link it to a series of other bombings. Jess's husband Scott joins an FBI/ATF task force searching for the suspect. While Scott chases the bomber, Jess continues her SAR activities. On a dark night, during a violent persistent storm, Jess sustains a horrible loss and is plunged into a pit of despair, her faith shredded.

Alara Beatty, dog mom and novice psychic, is already exhausted by her biological family and she hasn't even met most of them yet. Before she can even begin to process their antics, her mother shows up uninvited. Mother dearest has brought Alara's grumpy uncle and happy-go-lucky cousin too. They've only been in town long enough to dip their toes in the hard desert sand when a death threat aimed at Alara's new cousin appears. He begs her to use her psychic powers to find the culprit before they act on the threat and put him six feet below the desert.

Christmas is fast approaching, and around the Inn, Suzy and Josie are looking forward to relaxing and enjoying the holiday season with their friends and family. But when a box of puppies is dropped off on their doorstep on a frigid night, the chain of events that unfolds leads them straight to a murder and an illegal puppy mill that's operating in the area.

Emma Lapp tries to be the perfect daughter, to earn the loving embrace of her family and her Amish community in Pennsylvania. Yet she can't quite win her mother's smile - or her forgiveness for a transgression Emma can't quite place.... Emma knows she's a reminder of her mother's greatest sorrow, having been born on the same day Mamm lost her beloved sister. The one bright spot has been the odd trinkets anonymously left at her aunt's grave each year on Emma's birthday - gifts Emma secretly hides because they upset her parents.

With veterinarian Sydney Jones being targeted, K-9 Officer Gavin Walker and his furry partner must stand between her and certain death in Lenora Worth’s Hidden Christmas Danger. And the clock is ticking in Silent Night Explosion by Katy Lee—but can Jodie Chen trust the newest K-9 officer, Victor Abrams, and his dog to find a bomb and keep her alive…despite Victor’s shadowed past?

When decorator Meg Barrett travels to a remote mansion to help select period pieces for a new 1930s-style television mystery series, she's chilled to learn that the manor was once a mental asylum and the site of a mysterious decades-old murder. And when a fierce blizzard knocks out the power and strands Meg and her cohorts in the home's rickety old elevator, they emerge to discover that another person has been murdered—in the same macabre manner as the original victim.

Millie is happy that her childhood friend, Uriah Schrock, has returned to Harvest after decades away. He was sweet on Millie in their school days, but she only had eyes for her future husband. Now, there's a new spark between them, so Millie is concerned when Uriah doesn't show up at the Harvest concert series - or for his job as the Village square's groundskeeper. Perhaps Millie has been involved in too many murder investigations, but she has a sinking feeling. And when she and her best friend, Lois, find Uriah with the police, it seems she's right....

The secret to taking your business from mediocre to meaningfully different? Thinking like a marketer. It's also the secret to moving your organization from status quo to success story, and from busy to profitable. In an accessible, practical new guidebook, acclaimed marketing expert Kate Colbert offers fresh insights into the actions and attitudes that can accelerate your business success, sharpen your daily work, and balance your efforts to create value for customers while capturing value for the bottom line.

Widowed matchmaker Millie Fisher is anything but lonely between her mischievous goats, her quilting circle—and her habit of solving the odd murder or two . . . Millie's decidedly not Amish best friend, Lois Henry, is outspoken, colorful, and so hopelessly romantic, she's had four husbands. Millie doesn't judge, and she also doesn't expect to run into Lois's most recent ex, gambler Gerome Moorhead, in small-town Harvest, Ohio. With him is the very young, new Mrs. Moorhead, aka "Honey Bee."

It's the dead of winter in the Thousand Islands, and there's nothing that reminds Suzy and Josie about that fact more than sub-zero temperatures, bone-chilling winds, and finding a dead body under the ice wearing only shorts and a tee shirt. In addition, a rare Dandie Dinmont has been found wandering around the area and Suzy and Josie, while trying to figure out what might have happened to the man under the ice, are also doing everything they can to reunite the dog with its owner.