Showing results by narrator "Melanie Hooks" in All Categories

Hattie Percha is crushed when the riots start on her 10th birthday, and when she must move away from her treasured childhood home and friends, attending public school for the first time, she’s afraid her life is over. Then, she meets Beverly Jo Nichols, her first Black friend, and Crackers, a fearless tomboy. Despite opposition from Hattie’s mother and a racist teacher, the unlikely friends join forces. As the self-proclaimed Dream Girls, they challenge bigotry and intolerance, willing to do whatever it takes to hold onto what’s most precious to them all, their friendship.

Everybody loves a good ghost story, yet poor dead Vee feels anything but “good” being stuck upstage in the heavens of her own afterlife. She can peek in on Val, who’s “downstage” with the living but haunted by ghosts. Then there’s Julie, stubbornly stage left but longing to be downstage with Val. And finally, poor Peter remains solitary in his stage-rightness with the sneaking suspicion he might be dead wrong. Trapped at center stage lurks the demon Iago, willing to bridge heaven and hell to exit this cursed performance once and for all.

Marta Hamilton, who has by professional necessity always distanced herself from emotional commitment, lapsed by allowing herself the luxury of friendship with Sheila Schuler - and a night of wild sex with Marshall Grissom. Now, Sheila is probably dead, and, according to a genius physicists’ theory, Marshall soon will be. As she assumes her role as administrator of the time travel program, Marta must choose between the risks of loving someone, or the lonely safety of emotional solitude.

Following a global pandemic which has either killed or weakened most of the male population, women now dominate all aspects of life. Dr. Morgan Digby, married to a man rendered bedbound from his bout with manflu a decade prior, is working tirelessly on a vaccine, yet obstacles keep springing up in her path. When she meets a handsome neighbor who has never been exposed to the deadly virus, things become...complicated. There’s something between them, but he can’t leave his home.

The year is 2044. Housed in a secret complex beneath the eastern Arizona desert, a consortium of governments and corporations have undertaken a program on the scale of the Manhattan Project to bludgeon the laws of physics into submission and make time travel a reality. Fraught with insecurities, Marshall Grissom has spent his whole life trying not to call attention to himself, so he can’t imagine he would be remotely suited for the role of time travel pioneer.

Peri has had enough. She’s closing her business, marrying her detective boyfriend, and settling down to a life of ease – until her brother shows up, accused of a murder he swears he didn’t commit. Now she’s back in the thick of things, investigating the death of an engineer who may have been stealing techno-secrets from other companies. Her relationship with her brother is an icy one, at best, and she struggles with her ambivalence, as well as her desire to leave investigative work behind.

Hello, my name is Lil, and I can see the demon on your shoulder. I found my calling as a bartender in Laguna Beach, California. Home to sunshine, sand, and surf—and I provide the tropical drinks to go with your vacation vibe. Or I did until things went sideways. A woman nearly drowns. My brother, Ezra, is missing. Demons are climbing from the ocean depths. And I’m the only one who can see what’s really going on. The question is, can I stop it and bring Ezra home before the primordial god of the ocean claims his due?