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Two people with nothing in common, explore the streets of Florence and the hills of Tuscany together… And find in each other something that might just heal them both.
That Month In Tuscany by Inglath Cooper

 ❤️ Kindle Nation Daily Romance of the Day ❤️

That Month in Tuscany

by Inglath Cooper
4.6 stars – 269 reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:

That Month in Tuscany . . .

Ren Sawyer and Lizzy Harper live completely different lives. He’s a rock star with a secret he can no longer live with. She’s a regular person whose husband stood her up for a long planned anniversary trip.

On a flight across the Atlantic headed for Italy, a drunken pity party and untimely turbulence literally drop Lizzy into Ren’s lap. It is the last thing she can imagine ever happening to someone like her. But despite their surface differences, they discover an undeniable pull between them. A pull that leads them both to remember who they had once been before letting themselves be changed by a life they had each chosen.

Exploring the streets of Florence and the hills of Tuscany together – two people with seemingly nothing in common – changes them both forever. And what they find in each other is something that might just heal them both.

*** Previously titled Rock Her.

I loved this story! How refreshing to read something so sweet and light with just enough depth to the storyline that I couldn’t put this book down!5 star Amazon review

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It’s Freebie Friday! Download FREE Bestsellers Now, Including Inglath Cooper’s Nashville – Part One – Ready to Reach

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But first, a word from ... Today's Sponsor
A story of the first step in the lives of three peoples journey in the quest to follow their dream of success in music.Three who know music is a passion they all share,and the special bond you feel when the other person gets it,like a light lit in your soul.
Nashville - Part One - Ready to Reach
by Inglath Cooper
4.4 stars - 97 reviews
Supports Us with Commissions Earned
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here's the set-up:
New Adult Romance from the Author of Truths and Roses - Reached #11 on the Amazon Kindle Bestseller List

Ever thought a dream might pass you by?

Nineteen-year old CeCe Mackenzie is determined to make her dreams come true. She heads for Nashville with not much more to her name than a guitar, a Walker Hound named Hank Junior and an old car she'd inherited from her grandma called Gertrude. But when Gertrude ends up on the side of I-40 in flames, Nashville has never seemed farther away. Help arrives in the form of two Georgia football players headed for the Nashville dream as well. When Holden Ashford and Thomas Franklin stop to offer CeCe and Hank Junior a ride, fate may just give a nod to serendipity and meant to be. Because while CeCe is chasing after her dream, she might find love as well.
One Reviewer Notes:
Cece has some pretty terrible luck thrown at her when we first meet her. Her granny's car breaks down on the side of the road, she barely gets herself, her guitar, and Hank Jr out of the car before it blows up on her. But her luck may be about to change, or is it? Good guys and songwriting/singing duo Thomas and Holden pull over to help her; they seem to have a thing for damsels in distress.Things still go awry from time to time with CeCe and the boys but everything start to pick up with doors opening that should have taken years to open. There's chemistry, kisses, a night at the dog pound, and regret in this first novella. I absolutely loved this first book in the series. Inglath Cooper's writing pulls you in so much so that you are there experiencing everything that is going on in the book. Wonderful writing, plot, and what a sweet, sweet, place to end this one and start the next one.
Shannon Daniel
About the Author
Bestselling, RITA® Award winning author Inglath Cooper fell in love with books as soon as she learned how to read. She is a Virginia girl who also loves dogs, compassionate people, being outside, summertime, pretty much all vegetables and happiness. Bestselling, RITA® Award winning author Inglath Cooper fell in love with books as soon as she learned how to read. She is a Virginia girl who also loves dogs, compassionate people, being outside, summertime, pretty much all vegetables and happiness.
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Nashville - Part One - Ready to Reach

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Clarity

by Loretta Lost

4.3 stars – 78 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Fiercely independent Helen Winters was born completely blind, but she vowed never to let her disability keep her down. She did not expect a traumatic event to devastate her life and force her to drop out of college. Disillusioned by the cruelty of people, Helen retreated from society to live by herself as a reclusive writer in the woods–where no one could ever hurt her again.

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4.0 stars – 599 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Sixteen year-old, Skyla Messenger is a dead girl walking. When her newly remarried mother moves the family to Paragon Island, to a house that is rumored to be haunted, Skyla finds refuge in Logan Oliver, a boy who shares her unique ability to read minds. Skyla discovers Logan holds the answers to the questions she’s been looking for, but his reluctance to give her the knowledge she desires leaves her believing Logan has a few secrets of his own.

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4.3 stars – 170 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
With his acknowledged individual storytelling expertise, D. M. Mitchell pens yet another taut psychological thriller with a difference that twists and turns to its deliciously devious and unexpected conclusion. Discover for yourself why D. M. Mitchell is being hailed as one of the most exciting new writers of thriller and supernatural tales in the UK.

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A Distant Sun

by Grant Boshoff

4.4 stars – 32 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
As their sun slowly dies the future of the Emarian race hangs in the balance. Alynna, the last princess to a doomed people, crosses the galaxy in pursuit of their one remaining hope: the fabled dark matter from their star’s twin. It’s a mission of low odds and high risk.

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Witch Song

by Amber Argyle

4.4 stars – 395 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
The Witch Hunters have come for Brusenna, for she is the last. All the others have been captured by the Dark Witch. And without their magical songs to control nature, the world is dying.

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Thirst (Ava Delaney Book 1)

by Claire Farrell

4.2 stars – 265 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Ava Delaney calls herself a hybrid – a living, breathing human who happens to have vampire poison running through her veins. The only thing greater than her thirst for human blood is her capacity for guilt. She does her best to avoid the human world, for everyone’s sake.

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Here’s the set-up:
Most of you may know Steve Jobs as the charismatic CEO of Macintosh, Mac, or Apple. He’s that guy who almost always presented the latest release of the iPod, iTouch, iPhone, iPad, Macbook, etc. But there is more to him than that – infinitely more, in fact.

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★★★★★

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It’s Freebie Friday! Seven Free Bestselling eBooks, Available Now to Download Now! Today’s Spotlight Freebie: Inglath Cooper’s Nashville – Part One – Ready to Reach

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But first, a word from ... Today's Sponsor
Ms. Cooper has written such a beautiful story that gives you hope. It fills you with laughter, sadness, and many other emotions. You feel connected to the characters and really share in their successes and hurt in their failures.
Nashville - Part One - Ready to Reach
by Inglath Cooper
4.4 stars - 87 reviews
Supports Us with Commissions Earned
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here's the set-up:
New Adult Romance from the Author of Truths and Roses - Reached #11 on the Amazon Kindle Bestseller List

Ever thought a dream might pass you by?

Nineteen-year old CeCe Mackenzie is determined to make her dreams come true. She heads for Nashville with not much more to her name than a guitar, a Walker Hound named Hank Junior and an old car she'd inherited from her grandma called Gertrude. But when Gertrude ends up on the side of I-40 in flames, Nashville has never seemed farther away. Help arrives in the form of two Georgia football players headed for the Nashville dream as well. When Holden Ashford and Thomas Franklin stop to offer CeCe and Hank Junior a ride, fate may just give a nod to serendipity and meant to be. Because while CeCe is chasing after her dream, she might find love as well.
One Reviewer Notes:
What a well written novella this is! You are immediately drawn into the characters who are 3 dimensional and very realistic. So many romance novels make the good guy all good and the heroine so sweet you want to throw up, but these characters are normal people who could be your next door neighbors (well, if you lived in Georgia or Alabama 🙂 ). I read the book from cover to cover in one sitting it was that captivating.
Amazon Customer
About the Author
Bestselling, RITA® Award winning author Inglath Cooper fell in love with books as soon as she learned how to read. She is a Virginia girl who also loves dogs, compassionate people, being outside, summertime, pretty much all vegetables and happiness. Bestselling, RITA® Award winning author Inglath Cooper fell in love with books as soon as she learned how to read. She is a Virginia girl who also loves dogs, compassionate people, being outside, summertime, pretty much all vegetables and happiness.
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Nashville - Part One - Ready to Reach

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3.9 stars – 31 Reviews
Text-to-Speech: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
However, they don’t know how their race got here. No history book has an answer and no historian has the guts to find out. It’s as if the history of their race, the human race, originated in orbit around this planet. Any knowledge of their existence preceding 800 years has either been erased, or their Prime Director is correct–they were birthed here and their race didn’t previously exist.

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4.2 stars – 714 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
THE HOUSEWIFE ASSASSIN’S HANDBOOK (Book 1) Every desperate housewife wants an alias. Donna Stone has one, and it happens to be government-sanctions. But espionage makes for strange bedfellows, and brings new meaning to the old adage, “Honey, I’m home…”

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3.8 stars – 24 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Sweet and hardworking Eva has just graduated from college. Her sexually adventurous best friend, Nicole, has convinced her to take an island vacation to let off some steam and relax. Eva does not expect to meet a handsome man with a rock-hard body that reminds her of a Greek god, on her first night on the beach.

*  *  *

4.6 stars – 18 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Kai Lewis is a TV reporter with the inside scoop on Detroit’s juiciest corruption scandals. Years ago, her affair with Frank Anderson, the very handsome but very married lead news anchor, had taken her body, soul, and career to new heights. But Kai’s thrill ride with Frank ended in an unspeakable tragedy. Now, she avoids his advances, despite the deep feelings she still has for him.

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4.1 stars – 12 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Not suitable for die-hard Potter fans, Destiny Unfulfilled is fundamentally critical of the Potter series, examining such issues as the role of a protagonist, the writer’s contract with her readers, characterization, and shaggy dog resolutions.

*  *  *

4.1 stars – 22 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Who do you believe when everyone around you is a liar? Who do you trust when everyone has secret motives? How do you save you the future when you cannot remember your past?

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★★★★★

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Kindle Free Book Alert for June 1 Featuring Six Bestselling Freebies, Including Inglath Cooper’s Nashville – Part One – Ready to Reach

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But first, a word from ... Today's Sponsor
This is a delight and if you haven't read Inglath Cooper before this little novella will quickly make you a fan of all her books.
Nashville - Part One - Ready to Reach
by Inglath Cooper
4.4 stars - 84 reviews
Supports Us with Commissions Earned
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here's the set-up:
New Adult Romance from the Author of Truths and Roses - Reached #11 on the Amazon Kindle Bestseller List

Ever thought a dream might pass you by?

Nineteen-year old CeCe Mackenzie is determined to make her dreams come true. She heads for Nashville with not much more to her name than a guitar, a Walker Hound named Hank Junior and an old car she'd inherited from her grandma called Gertrude. But when Gertrude ends up on the side of I-40 in flames, Nashville has never seemed farther away. Help arrives in the form of two Georgia football players headed for the Nashville dream as well. When Holden Ashford and Thomas Franklin stop to offer CeCe and Hank Junior a ride, fate may just give a nod to serendipity and meant to be. Because while CeCe is chasing after her dream, she might find love as well.
One Reviewer Notes:
Inglath Cooper has a wonderful way of telling a story that captures one's imagination and keeping you interested and anxiously waiting on the next novella. I have read the second book also. Cannot wait for the third book. By the way, Ms. Cooper also includes the songs they sing with links to hear them sung. Check them out!
Terry A. Ontiveros
About the Author
Bestselling, RITA® Award winning author Inglath Cooper fell in love with books as soon as she learned how to read. She is a Virginia girl who also loves dogs, compassionate people, being outside, summertime, pretty much all vegetables and happiness. Bestselling, RITA® Award winning author Inglath Cooper fell in love with books as soon as she learned how to read. She is a Virginia girl who also loves dogs, compassionate people, being outside, summertime, pretty much all vegetables and happiness.
UK CUSTOMERS: Click on the title below to download
Nashville - Part One - Ready to Reach

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4.6 stars – 40 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Luna couldn’t stand it anymore, so she escaped Grandfather’s house and sought refuge in the backyard. And that’s where she discovered the mysterious hedge-fence gate…

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4.0 stars – 371 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Molly Bishop loves living in Manhattan and managing a boutique luxury hotel. She’s about to be promoted to her dream job of General Manager, the role she’s been striving for her entire career. There’s only one thing standing in her way.

*  *  *

3.2 stars – 94 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
As a child, all Ryce Dalton wanted to be was an Army Ranger. Conquering his dream, it was only 16 years later that he was forced into early retirement due to an injury. Sworn to defend his country, putting his combat and intelligence skills back to work, he has joined the Joint Border Task Force.

*  *  *

3.8 stars – 21 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:
Sweet and hardworking Eva has just graduated from college. Her sexually adventurous best friend, Nicole, has convinced her to take an island vacation to let off some steam and relax. Eva does not expect to meet a handsome man with a rock-hard body that reminds her of a Greek god, on her first night on the beach.

*  *  *

Here’s the set-up:
This book continues in the tradition of the first book in the series offering more high-impact, no B.S. experiments for rebooting your life, doubling your energy, and improving your health. The book challenges you to take any one of the experiments and implement it without fail for thirty days straight. And then to do it again. And again. At the end of one year, you will have rebooted your life and from there, the sky is the limit.

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Free Excerpt From Inglath Cooper’s CROSSING TINKER’S KNOB – 4.7 stars on 86 out of 93 rave reviews!

Last week we announced that Inglath Cooper’s Crossing Tinker’s Knob is our Romance of the Week and the sponsor of thousands of great bargains in the Romance category: over 200 free titles, over 600 quality 99-centers, and thousands more that you can read for free through the Kindle Lending Library if you have Amazon Prime!

Now we’re back to offer our weekly free Romance excerpt, and if you aren’t among those who have downloaded Tinker’s Knob, you’re in for a real treat:

Crossing Tinker’s Knob

by Inglath Cooper

4.7 stars – 93 Reviews
Kindle Price: $2.99
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Don’t have a Kindle? Get yours here.
Here’s the set-up:

People say you can’t ever go back. That some of the things that happen to us simply cannot be redone. But the paths of a life journey are rarely straight. They twist and turn and wind back across those once visited and long thought to have faded from existence.

Becca Miller has lived her life trying to do the right thing, even when its cost has been giving up the boy she loved and wanted to marry. The sacrifice she made for her sister isn’t one she regrets because there was no other choice for her to make. And for eighteen years, she lives this choice with full commitment and as little looking back as she can manage.

But when Matt Griffith returns to Ballard County for the funeral of his grandmother, the path that had seemed so straight begins to loop back and take her across feelings she thought she had put away for good. As it turns out, those roads we’ve traveled do not fade at all. They simply wait to be retraveled, leaving us with the decision to follow them exactly as we did before, or make a different choice and find out where it will lead us.

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  And here, for your reading pleasure, is our free romance excerpt:

Prologue

What is deservedly suffered must be borne with
calmness, but when the pain is unmerited,
the grief is resistless.
– Ovid

Then
Theres a moon tonight. It hangs in the sky above the barn, fat and full, a summer moon. It lights my path across the backyard, the parched grass beneath my feet making a brittle, crackling sound. Daddy says if we dont get some rain soon, the corn crop wont be worth cutting.

At the thought of him asleep in his bed, worn out from a day spent putting away over a thousand bales of hay, I feel a sharp pang of guilt for sneaking out of the house. I dont like hiding things from Mama and Daddy. But its not as if they wont know the truth soon enough.

Three weeks from today when I turn sixteen, John and I are getting married. I know were young, but Im just glad I found someone who wants the same life I want. Mama says when people are different and dont believe the same things, its not likely that a life together would ever work. My brother Jacob and my sister Becca are both choosing a different path, and I worry that what Mama said will come true for them.

Ive always loved our life. Unlike some of the girls I know from church, I never once wanted to be like the other people we saw in town on Saturday trips to the grocery store. Never wished for things we didnt have. I like the idea of being the same at the end of my life as I was at the beginning.

I tighten the strings of my white bonnet and pick up my pace, nearly running when I reach the big sliding doors at the front of the hay barn. I pull one side back, slip through, leaving it slightly cracked for light.

John is waiting inside for me. He smiles his lopsided smile and reaches for my hand. Hey, Emmy.

Hey, I say, and something inside me melts a little at the sound of his voice on my name. I guess at my age its hard to know what real love is, but I suspect what I feel for him is close enough. He makes me laugh, and seeing him fills me up with the kind of warm feelings I used to get when Grandma Austin would make me hot chocolate on snowy days.

He pushes a bale of hay against the wall for us to sit on, knocking to the floor the old metal pitchfork Daddy uses to dole out flakes of hay to the dairy cows. Once when I was a little girl, Becca left this exact pitchfork lying outside by the water troughs one morning when she was helping Daddy feed. I didnt see it and stepped on it. One of the sharp tines stuck through the ball of my foot, and Mama had to take me to the emergency room to get a tetanus shot. As a punishment, Becca had to do my milking chores for two weeks.

I start now to pick the fork up and prop it back in the corner, but John takes my hand and pulls me down next to him, and I forget about it.

We talk for a bit, sharing little pieces of our day and thoughts weve had about our wedding. He puts his hand on mine and looks at me with a sweet pride. Im going to talk to my dad about us living in the little house on our farm, he says.

I lean back and look at him, both surprised and pleased. You think itll be okay?

Once they get used to the idea, theyll be glad to have us so close.

I feel a wash of relief at this, just knowing thats one thing we wont have to pay for. John and I both realize well have a hard time making ends meet at first.

We sit, quiet, his hand still resting on mine. After a while, he leans over and kisses me, and I think how its nice to feel love in another persons touch. That out of all the things I want from life, this would top the list.

We kiss for a few minutes under the unspoken agreement that until were married, things wont go any farther again. I rub my thumb across the freckles on his cheek and then loop my fingers through his wavy red hair.

Maaatt! Becccca!

The voice booms out of nowhere, the names slurred at the edges. John and I both sit up with a start.

Who is it? John asks.

I dont know, I say, straightening my dress and standing.

The door opens, and three shadows fall across the darkened dirt floor of the old hay barn.

Matt! Becca! the bigger boy calls out again. You two in here going at it? Sayin your good-byes? You know hes gonna forget all about you, Beeecca, once hes at U-V-A with all those hot, smart chicks.

Theyre not here, John says, taking my hand and stepping forward into the sliver of moonlight shining through the open door.

Who the hell are you? The question contains more slur now than before, and I feel a pang of unease.

John. John Rutrough.

John John Root Trough, the boy repeats in a slow, mimicking voice.

Laughter floats out from the other two shadows and seems to hang suspended from the rafters above us.

Who are you? I ask.

The boy in front walks over to stand in front of me. I can smell the alcohol on his breath along with the sickeningly sweet scent of something else I dont recognize. Now what does it matter who I am?

Yall better go on now, I say, shivering even though the night air is muggy and hot.

The boy stares at me as if hes not sure Im worthy of his attention. Where are Matt and Becca? His cars parked over at the mailbox.

I dont know, I say. Maybe walking in the orchard. They do that sometimes.

He glances back at his friends and snarls a laugh. Matts gettin it in the orchard. I should have known.

Please. You have to go, I say, afraid my parents will wake up and come down to the barn.

He glances at me, his eyes squinting as if hes having trouble focusing. What are you two doing out here, anyway? Yall playin grown-ups?

The questions have something ugly at their core, and I feel a new wave of fear. I take a step back, and John reaches for my hand.

Aww, itnt that sweet? The boy lurches forward, reaching out to untie the strings of my bonnet. Maybe we need to give you two a lesson in what real grown-ups do when theyre alone. Looks to me, John John Root Trough, like you havent figured it out yet, seein as how you havent even gotten her out of her bonnet. But then what else would we expect from a Dunkard boy? Hard to learn about the world hidin behind your mamas skirt.

He yanks the bonnet off my head, one of the bobby pins in my hair catching. I yelp, and John lets go of my hand to give the boy a shove. John, no, I say. Let it go!

The boy staggers backwards and then rights himself like a listing buoy. He stares at John for a moment, as if he cant believe what he just did. His face contorts with anger, a black, drunken thundercloud of it. He pokes John in the chest with one finger and says, That how you want to play then?

Yall get on out of here, John says, and I hear the fear beneath the words.

Well go when were good and ready, the boy says. But first I think Id like to see whats under that dress. Its gotta be somethin to be hidden so well.

John makes a sound then that sounds like a roar of fury. He charges at the boy. They stumble backwards, and I hear myself scream as if the sound is coming from someone else.

John is no match for him, and they roll around on the dirt floor, kicking and throwing fists. I hear John groan, and I begin to scream for them to stop. The other two boys start trying to break it up, but the first one is much bigger and flings them off like paper dolls. John manages a swing that connects with the boys jaw and makes an awful cracking sound.

Everything goes completely still then, the boy touching his face and staring at John in disbelief. The moment just hangs there, and I start to pray as hard as I know how that they will leave.

But the boy erupts in a volcano of fury, running at John like a bull aiming to take down a wayward steer. And this is the moment I will relive over and over again. I see it in slow motion, the boys shoulder connecting with Johns chest. John reeling, arms flailing in mid-air. And then a horrible noise I cant identify as he hits the ground. Like the sound of a nail puncturing a tire as the air starts to hiss out.

I run to him, screaming, screaming. His eyes are wide open, an expression of shock frozen in place on his freckled face. And then I lower my gaze to the middle of his chest where the pitchfork tines have pierced straight through.

I put a hand to my mouth and drop to my knees, air refusing to fill my lungs. I think it was this exact moment when for all intent and purpose, I stopped breathing. Trapped in the forever haunting knowledge that if I had just picked up the pitchfork as Id known to do, the ending might have been so very different.


 

 

 

 

Fix Sunday

“The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family.”

 Thomas Jefferson

Now
Martha Miller loved Fix Sunday.

Especially one as nice as this warm, early spring afternoon when members of the Booker Hill Brethren Church flowed out the doors of the quaint white building onto the green grass surrounding it. Families extended invitations to follow each other home after the service for a meal and fellowship.

Martha had never felt as adept at pulling it off as many of the women now surrounding her in the front yard of the church. Most of them she had known the majority of her seventy-four years, and she’d often wished that she could be like those who showed not a single sign of apprehension when a dozen cars ended up in their driveway, hungry friends and neighbors pouring out the doors.

Martha’s own mother had always managed the day with grace and hospitality. As a child, Martha remembered Sundays when forty or more men, women and children would fill every table in their home, and even a few makeshift eating arrangements set up under the oak tree in the back yard – sheets of plywood on wooden barrels that were then draped in tablecloths. Martha’s mother had taught her well how to handle the preparation of food for an unknown number of guests. How to prepare huge pots of vegetable soup and apple cobblers early in the week that were then frozen and pulled out on Sunday morning where they were left to thaw so they could be quickly reheated after church.

Martha and her oldest daughter Rebecca, Becca as they had always called her, had done just this the previous Monday, using canned jars of vegetables, tomatoes, corn, squash and okra, which they’d put up last summer from Becca’s bountiful heirloom garden. There would be no question that they had enough food to go around this afternoon, and for this Martha was thankful.

Exactly one hour past the end of the church service, she stood at the doorway of her own family dining room, holding a pitcher of sweet tea in her hands. There were a dozen guests today plus three of her own family members, Becca, son-in-law Aaron and granddaughter Abby. Multiple threads of conversation could be heard from where Martha stood. She loved the fellowship of these Sunday afternoons, the always voiced appreciation of a good meal, the comfort to be found in repeated ritual and familiar faces.

She looked down the long harvest table to see who needed a refill, then stepped forward and added more tea to Esau Austin’s glass. Aaron had just finished sharing the story of one of their dairy cows who refused to go into her milking lane until Aaron put her favorite alfalfa hay at the front.

Esau thanked Martha for the tea, and then to Aaron, chuckled and said, “Easy enough to see who’s running that show.”

Warm laughter drifted up, and from her seat across the table, Becca glanced at her husband with affection. “They like to let him think he’s in charge.”

Once she’d completed a round with the tea, Martha took her own seat next to Abby who had finished her soup and was dipping out another serving from the big white stoneware bowl at the center of the table with the appetite of youth. “This is really good, Grandma,” she said.

“Thank you,” Martha said, patting Abby’s hand. “I’m glad you like it.”

Esau put down his glass of tea and ran a hand through his white beard. “I guess you all heard about Millie Griffith’s passing,” he said, his aging voice suddenly serious.

With the words, something in Martha’s heart caught, a spasm of sorts that startled her with its intensity. One hand automatically went to her chest. She lifted her gaze and let herself look at Becca only to find confirmation that Esau’s news had hit her with equal effect. Becca’s face had lost its color, her eyes brimming with instant tears.

Martha felt the curious gazes of those sitting nearby and forced normalcy into her voice when she said, “I’m so sorry to hear that. She was a kind lady.”

Esau nodded. “She was.”

“The funeral,” Becca said, the words uttered with what Martha heard as deliberate neutrality. “Do you know when it is?”

“Tomorrow morning,” Esau said. “At eleven o’clock.”

Becca stood and slid back her chair, the legs making a sudden scrape against the wood floor. She grasped the table edge, her fingers white against the grain, steadied herself and then said, “Excuse me, please,” before walking quickly from the room.

Martha heard the screen door off the kitchen at the back of the house wheeze open, then shut with a loud clap that made her flinch.

She glanced at her son-in-law and saw that he, too, had made a connection of worry in this news. It was there in the wrinkle of his brow, the firm set to his mouth. Martha could only hope that they were both wrong, and that there was no need for concern. Becca was a mature woman who had long ago put her own desires beneath the needs of her family. It was hardly fair to doubt her now.

But Martha also knew that Mrs. Griffith’s passing would bring the woman’s grandson back to the county. She knew, too, that there would be no talking Becca out of attending tomorrow’s funeral.

A wave of tiredness gripped her, so intense she could barely sit straight beneath its onslaught. Maybe, somewhere along the way, she had become complacent, allowed herself to believe that what was done was done. Even though she had once questioned the path they’d taken, she had deferred to her husband’s judgment, certain that their actions had been for the greater good.

Sitting here at this table, a table around which she had raised her three children, Becca, Jacob and Emmy, she could admit she no longer knew. And she could not help but wonder if, in the end, a single choice that had seemed so right at the time, an act of obedience on her part, would be the final definition of so many lives.

 

 

 

 

Departures and Arrivals

“Life can only be understood backwards;
but it must be lived forwards.”
– Soren Kierkegaard

Now
The day of Millicent Griffith’s funeral dawned as a sparkling April morning, a day when the entire town of Ballard appeared dewy and again renewed under spring’s generous return. The back parking lot of the Ballard Methodist Church overflowed with cars and trucks alike, late arrivers for the morning funeral squeezing in along the grass edging. Others left their vehicles in the downtown library’s lot and walked north uphill to the church in a somber procession of dark silhouettes.

At two minutes before eleven o’clock, Becca Brubaker lingered at the entrance of the church sanctuary, her hands trembling against the strap of her black purse. With a look of forced determination, she walked down the center aisle and took a seat in one of the back pews. She kept her gaze focused straight ahead, never once letting herself meet eyes with those around her, a representative mix of Ballard County citizens in modern clothing as well as some members of her own Brethren community wearing black shawls and black bonnets with their conservative print dresses.

The organist played a Charles Wellsley hymn, the old Methodist song rising up to fill the place with a combined sorrow and celebration. Becca sat with her hands folded in her lap, the words playing through her head, each stanza soothing her with a stoic peace. She’d told herself over and over while she was getting dressed this morning that she had every right to be here, every right to pay her respects to a woman who had meant a great deal to her, her motives void of anything more calculated than a wrenching sense of loss.

Drawing in a steady breath, she let her gaze sweep the front of the church, spotting him instantly at the end of the pew directly in front of the casket. Matt. The sight of him brought with it a start of electricity, a reigniting of something long ago extinguished.

Even from this distance, Becca could feel the waves of his grief, as if the connection between them had never been severed, and she could still feel what he felt.

Guilt clanged inside her like the ring of the church bells that had called everyone into this sanctuary to honor the life of Millicent Griffith. There had never been any question that he would be here today, and maybe that should have been all the reason she needed not to come. Certainly, this was true in the eyes of her mother and her husband. Even after all these years, still swimming upstream when it would have been so much easier to follow the natural path of things and simply stay away. And yet, she needed to say this good-bye.

Becca longed, suddenly, for Matt to turn his head, to drink in the sight of him, imagining that this full on appraisal would quench the thirst inside her the way a glass of cold water cooled her throat after hours of working in her garden. It was wrong, this need that had consumed her in the hours since she’d learned of Mrs. Griffith’s death. But a single thought had stuck in her mind, and she could not stop herself from worrying it the way a child worries a loose tooth. This was very likely the last time Matt would have a reason to come back to Ballard County, very likely the last time she would ever see him. She told herself that maybe there was relief to be found in this, as if the end were finally in sight, a final closing up of any lingering what-ifs.

People continued to file into the church, a blend of young, old and somewhere in between. Millie Griffith had been a woman known in the community for her devotion to helping those less fortunate. Programs created through her efforts varied from the collection of Christmas gifts for children with a parent in prison to the creation of a food bank where single mothers could come for groceries every Monday morning.

Despite the gap in generations between them, Mrs. Griffith had been Becca’s friend. For over fifteen years, Becca, along with her mama, and then later on her own, delivered eggs to the Griffith house on Highland Street once a week. By word of mouth alone, Mrs. Griffith single-handedly helped grow the Miller’s egg business to the point where Becca could hardly make all the deliveries in one day. And, to Becca, personally, she gave another kindness.

From the very beginning, Millicent Griffith had accepted Becca as if she were any other girl her grandson had chosen to date. As if she believed they had a right to be together.

Becca let her eyes drift to the back of Matt’s head again, struck anew with the reality of seeing him. She’d imagined it too many times to count, until their past began to seem like someone else’s dream.

During that last summer when they’d been together, Matt had been a seventeen-year old boy. Today, she saw the man he had become, his shoulders wider now beneath his dark suit, his jaw line more defined. He was the kind of man women call good-looking, the kind of man who would never be single. She could not help but wonder, then, why there was no one by his side today.

The reality of that ignited a spark of gladness inside her that seemed beneath her. Had she hoped somewhere deep down that if she could not have him, then no one else would, either?

The thought was a selfish one. After all, she had known from the beginning that the bar had been set too high. That in spite of what they felt for each other, people were different, and no matter how much they wanted to believe otherwise, those differences mattered.

In the end, those differences had separated them.

In the end, they mattered more than either of them could ever have imagined.

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Crossing Tinker’s Knob

by Inglath Cooper

4.7 stars – 91 Reviews
Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
Here’s the set-up:

People say you can’t ever go back. That some of the things that happen to us simply cannot be redone. But the paths of a life journey are rarely straight. They twist and turn and wind back across those once visited and long thought to have faded from existence.

Becca Miller has lived her life trying to do the right thing, even when its cost has been giving up the boy she loved and wanted to marry. The sacrifice she made for her sister isn’t one she regrets because there was no other choice for her to make. And for eighteen years, she lives this choice with full commitment and as little looking back as she can manage.

But when Matt Griffith returns to Ballard County for the funeral of his grandmother, the path that had seemed so straight begins to loop back and take her across feelings she thought she had put away for good. As it turns out, those roads we’ve traveled do not fade at all. They simply wait to be retraveled, leaving us with the decision to follow them exactly as we did before, or make a different choice and find out where it will lead us.

5-Star Amazon Reviews

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Jane Austen Girl – A Timbell Creek Contemporary Romance

by Inglath Cooper

4.0 stars – 1 Reviews
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Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled
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Here’s the set-up:

The very last thing on Grier McAllister’s Someday List is going back to Timbell Creek, Virginia, the town where she grew up. Timbell Creek holds too many bad memories for her, memories finally put to rest with a successful image consultant business in New York City and a hefty therapy bill. When an opportunity to choose a “Jane Austen Girl” for a visiting duke falls in her lap, the only catch that she must be from Grier’s hometown, Grier tells herself she’ll do what she needs to do and then leave it all behind for good.

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About The Author
Bestselling, RITA® Award-winning author Inglath Cooper fell in love with books as soon as she learned how to read. She is a Virginia girl who also loves dogs, compassionate people, being outside, summertime, pretty much all vegetables — and happiness.
For more about Inglath Cooper and her work, please visit her website.
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