Showing results for "Luca" in Literature & Fiction

She’s an angel. And she doesn’t mind dancing with a demon. That’s why I’d move mountains, dry seas, and hydrate the desert if it made her happy. She brought goodness to the world. It was only right that I made it hers, along with the two tiny beauties that shared her hazel eyes and perfect smile. For them, I’d do whatever. For them, I’d become whoever.

In this Audible Exclusive performance by Matt Lucas of Great Expectations, Charles Dickens demonstrates that conscience, loyalty and empathy are virtues far more valuable than intellect, wealth and social standing. First published in Dickens’ own periodical, All the Year Round, the novel was divided into nine monthly instalments, from December 1860 to August 1861. Unsurprisingly, it was an instant success and managed to sell over 100,000 copies per week. Though written at a challenging time in Dickens’ life, when the impending breakdown of his marriage loomed over him, Great Expectations proves to be one of his most optimistic, comical and romantic novels.

When Rilla Clark’s long lost father dies, she leaves New England and heads to his cottage in the Scottish Highlands to sort out his affairs. Rilla's determined that her visit will be a fleeting one. The little village of Applemore holds a lot of memories for her, but looking back might just open up her heart, which she’s kept well-guarded until now.

Beth Fraser has spent the last few years growing her business from scratch. She's turned the walled garden at Applemore House from an overgrown jungle into a beautiful and productive flower farm. A sudden change of circumstances means she has to find a way to make it pay more - and fast.

With her West Highland terrier Hamish at her side, Lucy plans to relax and read up on the women of nearby Bletchley Park. But the villagers of Little Maudley have other ideas and she finds herself caught up in the campaign to turn a dilapidated telephone box into a volunteer-run library. Along the way, she makes friends with treehouse designer Sam and finds herself falling for the charms of village life. And it seems Bunty has a special connection to Bletchley and the telephone box, one that she's kept secret for decades....

Lucas Fournier is only serious about one thing: hockey. The league's fun-loving charmer, Luc is always up for a good prank or a great lay, and he has no intention of settling down. But being traded to the Carolina Cold Fury - and to play alongside his big brother, Max - is no joke. With another title in sight, the last thing Luc wants is to let his new teammates down. To succeed, Luc will need to keep his head in the game and the most...er, demanding member of his anatomy in check. But when temptation hits, Luc hits back harder.

Hillside Farm, nestled in the rolling hills of the Welsh countryside, is a safe haven for Ella. Living on the remote farm, with just horses and her aunt Bron for company, Ella thinks she has finally found a place where she can forget her past and find peace. But the arrival of a small girl called Hope and her father, Harry, changes everything. As Ella helps the pair come to terms with their loss, she realises that she too deserves happiness. But is it too late to find it?

Isla's got the designer clothes and dream job as head stylist at an exclusive salon. She's been so single-minded in this quest that she's forgotten to have a life outside of it. When her aunt is in desperate need at her own salon, Isla heads to the remote island of Auchenmor to help. Finn is 35, and reality has just hit him hard. Now his best friends are about to have a baby, and everything is changing. When into his life walks Isla...

Harry Robertson is determined to make the Applemore Hotel a success. As the busy season ends, the builders are ready to get to work. He's closing the doors on the final guests of the year when a chance encounter changes everything. Capricious media star Ivy Winter causes a stir when she arrives in the tiny Highland village with her fiance Ben.

Frustrated that she spends all her time as either a mum to a football-obsessed teenager or a wife to a workaholic husband, Hannah wants something for herself. When the chance comes to take over the post office in Little Maudley, a charming Cotswold village, Hannah grabs it with both hands. She’ll have a career at last and also get her son, Ben, away from his trouble-making mates. But village life is not so picture-perfect after all.

For Journi St. James, traveling the world was status quo, something she had been doing since she was born. But as an international translator who speaks multiple languages, she changed what she was used to, parlaying her travel into an illustrious career. Traveling and negotiation was also the way Journi dealt with past hurt from a love not so long lost.

To Luca Matthews the dangers of the high mountain peaks are the air upon which he thrives. In the ruthless pursuit of his goals he would sacrifice anything - even another climber's life. His friends and family know and fear it. So when he sights a virgin peak in the Himalayas that exists on no map, no one is surprised when he becomes obsessed with being the first to scale it. Together with his climbing partner, Bill Taylor, they set off into a region of Tibet highly restricted by the Chinese.

When Kate is dumped on her best friend's wedding day, she realises she's now homeless as well as jobless. She decides to take a job on a remote Scottish island. Her grouchy new boss, Roddy, is unimpressed with her and makes it clear she's got a lot to prove. Island life has no room for secrets, and Roddy's trying to keep something quiet. When his ex appears back on the island, tensions rise. What is Fiona planning - and can she be stopped before it's too late?

In 1813, upon her marriage to Mr. Collins, the rector of Hunsford Parsonage, Charlotte Collins née Lucas left her childhood home in Hertfordshire for Kent, where she is set to live out her life as the parson’s wife, in an endless procession of dinners at Rosings Park, household chores, correspondence, and minding her poultry. But Mrs. Collins carries with her a secret, a peculiar preference, which is destined to turn all her carefully laid plans on their head.

In this anthology, you'll find 17 tales of conflict and heroism, exploration and discovery, endurance and triumph. Flee the apocalypse of modern-day Earth, fly a fighter in the cold emptiness of deep space, and find new life on the distant shores of an alien world. You might even discover something about yourself as each author opens a window on the soul of mankind.

Would-be gardener Daisy can't believe her luck when her parents announce they're off on a midlife-crisis gap year, leaving her in charge of their gorgeous garden. After a turbulent few months, a spell of quiet in the countryside is just what she needs. As Daisy wrestles the garden, her feelings for handsome Irishman George begin to take root. But Daisy's heart's desire - her parents' garden - is under threat.... Village life is turning out to be far from peaceful.

Adrift during the summer after she finishes college, a young woman takes a holiday with her mother in the rugged Australian coastal town of Sailor's Beach. As she searches for something, anything, to anchor her in the face of an uncertain future, Jude arrives. Jude, an older man who offers her the stability she craves. Jude, who will change everything. Many years later, as questions about past and present gain a new urgency, she looks back on the summer that shaped her and the woman she yearned to become.

What if the figure that haunted your nightmares as a child, the myth of the man in the woods, was real? He'll slice your flesh. Your bones he'll keep. Twenty years ago, four teenagers went exploring in the local woods, trying to find to the supposed home of the Bone Keeper. Only three returned. Now, a woman is found wandering the streets of Liverpool, horrifically injured, claiming to have fled the Bone Keeper.

It’s rumoured that Dickens wanted to return to his classic novel Oliver Twist, to bring him back into a later book as an older character, but he never managed this before he died. However, if Oliver had returned, what would he have been like? Would the scars of his childhood affect the man he would become? And what of ‘Dodger’, sent to a land halfway around the world, his friend, mentor and master dead because of Oliver? Dodge & Twist is that story. The tale of two boys, 12 years later, returning into each other’s lives - for both good and bad.

"Se scrivo ciò che sento è perché così facendo abbasso la febbre di sentire". "Soares va scrivendo minuziosamente, con la maniacale puntigliosità del contabile, il suo diario: grandioso zibaldone fatto di journal intime, di riflessioni, di appunti, di impressioni, di meditazioni, di vaneggiamenti e di slanci lirici che egli chiama Libro e che noi potremmo chiamare romanzo" (dall’Introduzione di Antonio Tabucchi).