Showing results by narrator "Mary Sarah Agliotta" in All Categories

Dutch-American storyteller Hilda Van Stockum provides us with another episode in the life of the Mitchell family, this time taking on life as it comes in a truly unforgettable Canadian summer.

On the eve of her profession as a nun, Lady Graeye Charwyck is called home to Medland by the father who disavowed her years earlier for the devil's mark she bears. Desperate to escape the convent, she agrees to wed a man she detests to provide an heir for her family's holdings. But when the king declares the Charwyck lands forfeit and awards them to their enemy, Graeye once more finds herself discarded.

Lizanne Balmaine has spent years honing her skills at arms, determined she will never again be at the mercy of any man. When she comes face to face with the one who stole her future, she seizes the opportunity to exact revenge. Soon he is her prisoner, at her mercy. But something is different about him, something that makes her question her purpose. Is it possible a man can be so changed? More, can she right the wrong that could lay ruin to her family?

He married for money, she wed by force. On the brink of losing everything, the Duke of Summerton marries heiress Caroline Howlett, but at what cost? She wants neither his crumbling estate nor his title, and what is he, as a man, without them? Before he can resolve this dilemma, something more dangerous than doubt threatens their marriage. When Caroline said she'd rather be dead than married to the duke, she hadn't meant it literally.

Vis and Ramin is one of the world's great love stories. It was the first major Persian romance, written between 1050 and 1055 in rhyming couplets. This remarkable work has now been superbly translated into heroic couplets (the closest metrical equivalent of the Persian) by the poet and scholar Dick Davis.

Vis and Ramin had immense influence on later Persian poetry and is very probably also the source for the tale of Tristan and Isolde, which first appeared in Europe about a century later.

Moments before the wedding, Christopher Sterry finds the groom, his twin brother, murdered. One would expect Christopher to become the next Earl of Longford. No one would be surprised if he married his twin's almost-bride, Helen Grove. She is, after all, his closest friend and confidante. Except Christopher is deaf in an inflexible world that believes a deaf mute is no better than a barbaric half-wit, unfit to be an earl and quite capable of murdering his brother.

Bonnie's and Debbie's desire to get rich causes them to respond to a sure-thing magazine advertisement. They are soon embarked upon an ambitious summer of selling up and down the river. Not that circumstances end quite in the way they had imagined!

Probably the most shocking of the Brontës' novels, this novel had an instant and phenomenal success and is widely considered to be one of the first sustained feminist novels. A mysterious widow, Mrs. Helen Graham, arrives at Wildfell Hall, a nearby old mansion. A source of curiosity for the small community, the reticent Helen and her young son Arthur are slowly drawn into the social circles of the village.

School in the Kentucky hills goes from August to the last Friday before Christmas. After that the snows are too high, and later, the thawing rivers too full, for the Fairchild children, and their neighbors, the Wattersons, the Sawyers, and the Huffs to make it safely to the little school house in the woods. Now that Althy is 14, Mr. Fairchild has other plans for the long winter months. Learn, along with Bonnie, Debbie, Chris, and Emmy, what it is like to have school at home in the early 1900s.

Convent-bound Lady Beatrix Wulfrith is determined to aid her sister in escaping marriage to their family's enemy. Unaware of the sacrifice that awaits her, she leads their pursuers astray only to meet with an accident that forever alters her destiny and takes the life of a young knight whose brother vows he will not rest until the lady is brought to justice.

Savushun chronicles the life of a Persian family during the Allied occupation of Iran during World War II. It is set in Shiraz, a town which evokes images of Persepolis and pre-Islamic monuments, the great poets, the shrines, Sufis, and nomadic tribes within a historical web of the interests, privilege, and influence of foreign powers; corruption, incompetence, and arrogance of persons in authority; the paternalistic landowner-peasant relationship; tribalism; and the fear of famine.

In the first of three books about their adventures, Daddy has just gone off to World War II. One of his final words to his daughter Joan is, "No dogs!" She would dearly love such a pet, but life is full and so many new friends - pets as well as people - join the Mitchells, so she hardly has time to think about dogs. The children form a club to do their part for the war-effort - first and foremost helping Mother, of course.

Twelfth century England: Two men vie for the throne: King Stephen the usurper and young Duke Henry the rightful heir. Amid civil and private wars, alliances are forged, loyalties are betrayed, families are divided, and marriages are made. For four years, Lady Annyn Bretanne has trained at arms with one end in mind - to avenge her brother's murder as God has not deemed it worthy to do. Disguised as a squire, she sets off to exact revenge on a man known only by his surname, Wulfrith.

Even if she must sell herself in marriage to the highest bidder, Lady Laura Middleton is determined to provide her daughter a home and protector. But when Queen Eleanor presents her cousin with four suitors, among them is one who believes Laura betrayed him 10 years past. Despite her attempts to discourage his pursuit, he is determined to have her for the dowry needed to save his lands.

Sleep disorders specialist Kennedy Plain has been diagnosed with a fatal brain tumor. When her research subject dies after trying to convince her he has achieved dream-induced time travel and her study is shelved, she enlists herself as a subject to complete her research.

The Fairchild family is here again, and this time, Bonnie is old enough to begin the great adventure - school! We join Bonnie in the excruciating anticipation of the first day, when she will wear her new dress, carry a first reader and slate, and displaying nonchalance as she braves the swinging bridge - enter into the mysteries of schoolroom learning and playground rites in a woodland setting of the early 1900s.

Believing only death will prevent him from returning to England, Sir Lucien de Gautier answers his king's call to arms. When he is captured and his family refuses the ransom demand, he finds himself bound to the oars of a galley. Enraged and embittered, he has no hope of escape - until a rich merchant's wife offers him freedom.

In Northanger Abbey, a young woman's penchant for sensational Gothic novels leads to misunderstandings in the matters of the heart. Austen's first, this is considered by many to be among her most charming novels.

It is two years after the events in Canadian Summer. The Mitchells are settled in their new home, and twins have just been added to the family. With Mother recovering from the births and with other changes in the household, the children must come to terms with themselves in new ways.

Feisty Maggie MacBede will never marry a warrior. Och no! With eight strapping brothers and a warrior of a Da, she has had enough of holding her own against great headstrong men. She’ll not risk her heart to the sword. Give her a poet, a bard, any man but a fighting man, and she will find her match.