Showing results by narrator "Pilar Witherspoon" in All Categories

After a decade away, Parker Bennett returns home with a traveling troupe to perform a play based on Uncle Tom's Cabin at the Kalispell Opera House. Parker has relished his life on the road, but being home awakens long-buried emotions when he encounters his first love, Johanna St. John. He can't help but wonder if there might still be a place for him in her heart.

In 1774, Juliet Catesby lives with her father and sister at Royal Vale, the James River plantation founded by her Virginia family over a century before. Indigo cultivation is her foremost concern, though its export tethers her family to the powerful Buchanan clan of Glasgow, Scotland. When the heir of the Buchanan firm arrives on their shores, Juliet discovers that her father has secretly arranged for one of his daughters to marry the Scot as a means of canceling the family's debt. Confident it will be her younger, lovelier sister, Juliet is appalled when Leith Buchanan selects her instead.

After her father's death, Lizzy Brookstone, the star trick rider of the all-female Brookstone Wild West Extravaganza, loses interest in performing. Ella Fleming is fleeing a forced engagement when she stows away on the Brookstone train. Lizzy finds her and gives her a job in the costume department. When Mary Reichert, a former sharpshooter for the show, learns that her brother, August, has been killed at the Fleming farm, she returns to the show to find the truth, As the three women work together to discover how August died, Lizzy strives to hold the show together.

The year 1924. After six months in Hollywood, young British widow Emma Blackstone has come to love her new employer, glamourous movie-star Kitty Flint — even if her late husband’s sister is one of the worst actresses she’s ever seen. Looking after Kitty and her three adorable Pekinese dogs isn’t work academically minded Emma dreamed of, but Kitty rescued her when she was all alone in the world. Now, the worst thing she has to worry about is the shocking historical inaccuracies of the films Kitty stars in.

Left at an orphanage as a child, Thea Reed vowed to find her mother someday. Now grown, her search takes her to Pleasant Valley, Wisconsin, in 1908. When clues lead her to a mental asylum, Thea uses her experience as a postmortem photographer to gain access and assist groundskeeper Simeon Coyle in photographing the patients and uncovering the secrets within. However, she never expected her personal quest would reawaken the legend of Misty Wayfair, a murdered woman who allegedly haunts the area and whose appearance portends death.

Maggie Molinaro survived a hardscrabble childhood in the downtrodden streets of Manhattan to become a successful businesswoman. After a decade of sacrifice, she now owns a celebrated ice cream company. But when she offends a corrupt banker, she unwittingly sets off a series of calamities that threaten to destroy her life's work.

In "Legacy of Love", Sarah Gooding never suspected returning a brooch to an elderly woman would lead to a job and introduce her to the woman's grandson. Widow Ruth Albright uses the family brooch as collateral for a loan from the local banker and hopes for a second chance at love in "Gift of the Heart". In "A Shot at Love", Fleeta Brady never expected her family's brooch might be how a fellow hunter turns her attention from competition to romance. Maddie Winslow stumbles upon an old family brooch in "Because of You". Might it finally be her turn for love?

A year after the Civil War, courageous former Union nurse Lydia McQuire was gamely scraping out an honest living. But now, as she said yes to marrying a stranger, her knees gave way with fear. Mr. Devon Quade had seemed polite and handsome when she answered his ad for a wife. Only after Lydia had arrived in Washington territory did she learn that her bridegroom wasn't to be sweet Devon Quade, but his older brother Brigham. Lydia's dislike of him was instantaneous...yet Brigham was awakening in her a white-hot passion.

May, 1924. It's been months since young British widow Emma Blackstone arrived in Hollywood to serve as companion to Kitty Flint: her beautiful silent-movie star sister-in-law. Kitty is generous, kind-hearted . . . and a truly terrible actress. Not that Emma minds; she's too busy making her academic parents turn in their graves with her new job writing painfully historically inaccurate scenarios for Foremost Studios. So when one of Kitty's old flames calls Emma and tells her it's imperative he meet with Kitty that morning, she's not surprised. Until, that is, he adds that lives depend on it.

Exiled from his beloved Acadie in Canada, Bleu Galant has little on his mind but survival as the tumultuous French and Indian War comes to a close. When his journey to Virginia's Rivanna River settlement takes an unexpected turn, he crosses paths with Brielle Farrow—a woman whose presence stirs something in him he cannot explain nor express. Unable to forget her, his decision to help her takes them across an ocean into a lavish world he's never known. Will their intricate tie decide not only her fate but his future?

Natalia Blackstone is a rarity in Gilded Age America. As a trusted analyst for her father's bank, she is helping finance the legendary Trans-Siberian Railway. From her office in New York City, Natalia relies on a charming Russian aristocrat to oversee the construction of the railroad on the other side of the world.

Ella Fleming is on the run from her past and the secrets that could tear her family apart. As a member of the Brookstone Wild West Extravaganza, a wild west show comprised of all-female performers, her uncanny talent for trick riding impresses the viewers. Only while performing can she forget the truth about who she really is - the daughter of a murderer. Phillip DeShazer blames himself for his father's death and has done his best to bury his guilt in work and drink. Realizing he needs something more, he seeks answers and finds support and kindness from the beautiful Ella Fleming.

Set during the Golden Age of Pirates and the shadowy aftermath of the Salem witch trials, this vivid literary debut is inspired by the captivating true story of real-life pirate Samuel Bellamy, combining high seas adventure, star-crossed longing, surprisingly timely questions about social justice and freedom, and the emotionally satisfying tale of one strong-willed young woman determined to choose her own path.

Despite her unconventional upbringing - she'd been adopted off the orphan train by the local "madam" - Emma Chalmers was the most prim and proper young lady in all of Whitneyville. Why, she wouldn't even permit Fulton Whitney to kiss her, and they were practically engaged!

When Jack McLaughlin drifted into Springwater, he carried little more with him than his bitter memories of the Civil War and the shattering secret of a promise betrayed in the heat of battle. Wounded soul-deep, and fearing the wrath of his own parents, Jack has hidden his identity and come to Springwater to see his mother and father from afar, even if he can't bear to face them. Taking odd jobs and keeping a low profile, Jack finds a safe haven at the town's new rooming house.

After witnessing a wrongful conviction as a young girl, Rebecca Whitman—the first female court reporter in Montana—is now determined to defend the innocent. During a murder trial, something doesn't sit well with her about the case, but no one except the handsome new Carnegie librarian will listen to her.

As the formation of Glacier National Park takes Eleanor Briggs and her conservationist father on a journey west to advocate for public lands, her heart carries the weight of a painful past. Since the death of her mother, she has spent her life traveling the country with her father and helping him with his work, but now he’s considering settling down and writing a book—and she’s not sure what that means for her future.

The practice of ministering to the widows and orphans is reflected in this story of Christina Willems, a young woman from Kansas, in 1884, who is determined to reopen the poor farm she manages after a fire devastates the property. She finds opposition from many surprising corners but an unlikely ally in a lumber mill owner who wants nothing more than to hold himself aloof from the world and its troubles. Levi Jonnson agrees to take care of one of the poor farm residents, a young blind boy - and in doing so opens himself up to Christina's world in ways he wouldn't have imagined.

Linda Lael Miller charms with this unforgettable Western love story of a runaway bride who wants only to hear three little words from a dashing Oregon lumber baron: my darling Melissa. When beautiful heiress Melissa Corbin discovers on her wedding day that her groom has a mistress, she begs for a ride out of town on Quinn Rafferty's private railway car.

Eleven-year-old Amrie St. Pierre is catching tadpoles with her friend Finn O'Reilly when the Federal fleet first steams up the Mississippi River in the spring of 1862. With the surrender of New Orleans, Amrie's sleepy little village of St. Francisville - strategically located between the last river outposts of Vicksburg and Port Hudson - is now frighteningly vulnerable. As the roar of canons inches ever closer and food, shoes, and life-giving medicines become increasingly scarce, Amrie is forced to grow up fast.