The Front Porch Club

The Front Porch Club
Author: Michelle Major
Publisher: Harlequin
Total Pages: 382
Release: 2023-05-23
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0369723112

“Perfect for fans of Debbie Macomber.” —Publishers Weekly on The Last Carolina Sister They have nothing in common—except a need to start over… The drawback to having a picture-perfect life is that there’s nowhere to go but down—and Annalise Haverford is falling fast. Once, she was the self-proclaimed queen bee of Magnolia, North Carolina. Now her husband has been arrested for fraud, and she’s become an outcast in the shallow circles she used to rule. There’s only one affordable rental in town, and it’s owned by the woman Annalise got fired from a lucrative job. Much as single mother Shauna Myer would like to refuse Annalise, who treated her like dirt on the bottom of her red-soled shoe, she needs that rent money. But when Shauna’s first love arrives in town, unraveling secrets she’d hoped to keep, Annalise becomes her unlikely defender. Meghan Banks, an elementary school art teacher whose quiet existence suddenly descends into chaos, is thrown an unexpected lifeline by Annalise, too. As spring ripens into a sultry summer, the three spur each other on to share their fears and dreams, face new challenges, and seize second chances. Because no matter how turbulent life may be, it’s much easier to navigate those choppy waters when you’re buoyed by true friendship…­ Bonus novella! The last Carlyle sister, new mother Trinity, finds love where she least expects it—with Magnolia’s upstanding chief of police, Asher Davis. Both Trinity and Asher think their romantic days are behind them. But then Asher asks Trinity for just one dance… The Carolina Girls Book 1: Wildflower Season Book 2: Mistletoe Season Book 3: Wedding Season Book 4: The Wish List Book 5: The Front Porch Club

From the Front Porch to the Front Page

From the Front Porch to the Front Page
Author: William D. Harpine
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
Total Pages: 244
Release: 2005
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9781585445592

The last presidential campaign of the nineteenth century was remarkable in a number of ways. -It marked the beginning of the use of the news media in a modern manner. -It saw the Democratic Party shift toward the more liberal position it occupies today. -It established much of what we now consider the Republican coalition: Northeastern, conservative, pro-business. It was also notable for the rhetorical differences of its two candidates. In what is often thought of as a single-issue campaign, William Jennings Bryan delivered his famous "Cross of Gold" speech but lost the election. Meanwhile, William McKinley addressed a range of topics in more than three hundred speeches--without ever leaving his front porch. The campaign of 1896 gave the public one of the most dramatic and interesting battles of political oratory in American history, even though, ironically, its issues faded quickly into insignificance after the election. In From the Front Porch to the Front Page, author William D. Harpine traces the campaign month-by-month to show the development of Bryan's rhetoric and the stability of McKinley's. He contrasts the divisive oratory Bryan employed to whip up fervor (perhaps explaining the 80 percent turnout in the election) with the lower-keyed unifying strategy McKinley adopted and with McKinley's astute privileging of rhetorical siting over actual rhetoric. Beyond adding depth and detail to the scholarly understanding of the 1896 presidential campaign itself (and especially the "Cross of Gold" speech), this book casts light on the importance of historical perspective in understanding rhetorical efforts in politics.

He Said

He Said
Author: John Amerson
Publisher: Page Publishing Inc
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2018-08-22
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1642981605

He said: Long before Earth and the stars that you see in the night sky were created, there were thousands upon thousands of planets throughout the universe supporting life. The inhabitants of the planets live in peace. The gods were pleased. Yes, I said "the gods," not one, not just your god but all the gods. Even back then no one knew how many there were, how they came to be, or where they came from. Some of the inhabited planets were only a few million miles apart. As the inhabitants of the planets began to venture out into space they encountered other races and cultures. Wars broke out. And soon the whole universe was filled with warring planets determined to conquer one another. The gods became angry. Mankind had become a disappointment. The gods decided to put an end to all the violence. Your scientists got the big bang theory practically right. It wasn't the creation of the universe. It was the destruction of the universe. Earth and what you see in the night sky is the aftermath, the rubble, you might say, of a universe that had been home to thousands upon thousands of inhabited planets.

The Front Porch Revolution

The Front Porch Revolution
Author: Robert H. Lengel
Publisher: FriesenPress
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2018-06-07
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 1525519859

A piece of music is more than the sum and sequence of its notes. The spaces between the notes, the rests or silences, are just as essential. Without those spaces, the notes do not properly relate to each other and even the most profound composition degrades into mere noise. Front porches metaphorically represent those rest-spaces in our lives and they are vanishing. Without them we are denying ourselves access to our music and possibility – and the evidence is clear at all levels of interaction. The social and political discourse in this country has, of late, eroded into noise and acrimony, dialogue having been abandoned for weaponized partisan monologues. Diatribes and rhetoric are gleefully accelerated like charged particles online, and on competing TV news and talk radio shows. In fact, this dynamic is experienced in meetings of any scale where diverse perspectives clash around topics we care about. But ask yourself, what is being accomplished beyond gridlock, frayed relationships and destructive polarization. We need to meet in new ways. The Front Porch Revolution is about the need to reassert true conversation and dialogue and reaffirm an earnest commitment to genuine communication. If anything is to be accomplished (and there is much that needs to be accomplished) we must be able to hear ourselves think and be present with our personal stories that give context to that thinking. This is more likely to happen on front porches than on the floor of Congress, in board rooms, in classrooms or on Facebook or Twitter. Viewing the world from the front porch invites a new way of thinking about our communication challenges, leadership and what we have become in the absence of front porches. Based on decades of research and first-hand experience at the Center for Professional Excellence at the University of Texas at San Antonio, The Front Porch Revolution maps out a lucid thoughtful and hopeful path forward to possibility.

Fight Club: A Novel

Fight Club: A Novel
Author: Chuck Palahniuk
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages: 220
Release: 2005-10-17
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0393066398

The first rule about fight club is you don't talk about fight club. Chuck Palahniuk showed himself to be his generation’s most visionary satirist in this, his first book. Fight Club’s estranged narrator leaves his lackluster job when he comes under the thrall of Tyler Durden, an enigmatic young man who holds secret after-hours boxing matches in the basements of bars. There, two men fight "as long as they have to." This is a gloriously original work that exposes the darkness at the core of our modern world.

Blue Chicago

Blue Chicago
Author: David Grazian
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 332
Release: 2005-11-15
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780226305899

The club is run-down and dimly lit. Onstage, a black singer croons and weeps of heartbreak, fighting back the tears. Wisps of smoke curl through the beam of a single spotlight illuminating the performer. For any music lover, that image captures the essence of an authentic experience of the blues. In Blue Chicago, David Grazian takes us inside the world of contemporary urban blues clubs to uncover how such images are manufactured and sold to music fans and audiences. Drawing on countless nights in dozens of blues clubs throughout Chicago, Grazian shows how this quest for authenticity has transformed the very shape of the blues experience. He explores the ways in which professional and amateur musicians, club owners, and city boosters define authenticity and dish it out to tourists and bar regulars. He also tracks the changing relations between race and the blues over the past several decades, including the increased frustrations of black musicians forced to slog through the same set of overplayed blues standards for mainly white audiences night after night. In the end, Grazian finds that authenticity lies in the eye of the beholder: a nocturnal fantasy to some, an essential way of life to others, and a frustrating burden to the rest. From B.L.U.E.S. and the Checkerboard Lounge to the Chicago Blues Festival itself, Grazian's gritty and often sobering tour in Blue Chicago shows us not what the blues is all about, but why we care so much about that question.

The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires

The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires
Author: Grady Hendrix
Publisher: Quirk Books
Total Pages: 408
Release: 2020-04-07
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 168369144X

“This funny and fresh take on a classic tale manages to comment on gender roles, racial disparities, and white privilege all while creeping me all the way out. So good.”—Zakiya Dalila Harris, author of The Other Black Girl Steel Magnolias meets Dracula in this New York Times best-selling horror novel about a women's book club that must do battle with a mysterious newcomer to their small Southern town. Bonus features: • Reading group guide for book clubs • Hand-drawn map of Mt. Pleasant • Annotated true-crime reading list by Grady Hendrix • And more! Patricia Campbell’s life has never felt smaller. Her husband is a workaholic, her teenage kids have their own lives, her senile mother-in-law needs constant care, and she’s always a step behind on her endless to-do list. The only thing keeping her sane is her book club, a close-knit group of Charleston women united by their love of true crime. At these meetings they’re as likely to talk about the Manson family as they are about their own families. One evening after book club, Patricia is viciously attacked by an elderly neighbor, bringing the neighbor's handsome nephew, James Harris, into her life. James is well traveled and well read, and he makes Patricia feel things she hasn’t felt in years. But when children on the other side of town go missing, their deaths written off by local police, Patricia has reason to believe James Harris is more of a Bundy than a Brad Pitt. The real problem? James is a monster of a different kind—and Patricia has already invited him in. Little by little, James will insinuate himself into Patricia’s life and try to take everything she took for granted—including the book club—but she won’t surrender without a fight in this blood-soaked tale of neighborly kindness gone wrong.

A History of the Greenwich Waterfront: Tod's Point, Great Captain Island and the Greenwich Shoreline

A History of the Greenwich Waterfront: Tod's Point, Great Captain Island and the Greenwich Shoreline
Author: Karen Jewell
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 213
Release: 2011-06-21
Genre: History
ISBN: 1614230765

The lives of the distinguished citizens and memories of the Connecticut Gold Coast town are chronicled here. The historic community of Greenwich is nestled along Connecticut's famed Gold Coast. The shores and waves of Long Island Sound draw people to its unique seaside, which also maintains a peaceful "residents only" beach. As a coastal community the opportunities for businesses were plentiful, from the exporting of oysters to the Palmer Engine Company who supplied engines for every lifeboat during WWII. This pristine waterfront is home to historic Tod's Point and has a plethora of elite Yacht Clubs dotting the shoreline. Author Karen Jewell chronicles the lives of distinguished citizens and the memories of yesteryear in her latest coastal narrative detailing the Greenwich waterfront.

A Book Club's Guide to Murder & Mayhem

A Book Club's Guide to Murder & Mayhem
Author: Bethany Barker
Publisher: Harbor Lane Books, LLC
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2024-04-02
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

A dead body, a large inheritance from an ex-boyfriend, a scam netting three-quarters of a million dollars, and a love attraction throw Suzie Tuft’s serene writing life into chaos. Textbook writer, Suzie Tuft, discovers a body near her rural home and learns he was an attorney from the estate of her deceased ex-boyfriend, who bequeathed her a small fortune. Suzie’s life is thrown into chaos when she is threatened by the ex’s crazy live-in girlfriend and his unsavory friends looking to recover nearly a million dollars from a con they executed him. Fortunately, Suzie has her book club friends to help her unravel the mystery, all while falling in love with the handsome detective investigating the murder. A Book Club’s Guide to Murder & Mayhem is the first book in A Suzie Tuft Mystery series in which a textbook writer recruits her book club friends to help find the killer of the victim she found near her rural home.