Books published by publisher Harlequin Audio and Blackstone Audio

[Read by Richard Armitage]The Tattooist of Auschwitz is based on the true story of Lale and Gita Sokolov, two Slovakian Jews, who survived Auschwitz and eventually made their home in Australia. In that terrible place, Lale was given the job of tattooing the prisoners marked for survival--literally scratching numbers into his fellow victims' arms in indelible ink to create what would become one of the most potent symbols of the Holocaust. Lale used the infinitesimal freedom of movement that this position awarded him to exchange jewels and money taken from murdered Jews for food to keep others alive. If he had been caught he would have been killed; many owed him their survival. There have been many books about the Holocaust--and there will be many more. What makes this one so memorable is Lale Sokolov's incredible zest for life. He understood exactly what was in store for him and his fellow prisoners and he was determined to survive -- not just to survive, but to leave the camp with his dignity and integrity intact, to live his life to the full. Terrible though this story is, it is also a story of hope and of courage. It is also -- almost unbelievably -- a love story. Waiting in line to be tattooed, terrified and shaking, was a young girl. For Lale -- a dandy, a jack-the-lad, a bit of a chancer -- it was love at first sight and he determined not only to survive himself, but to ensure that Gita did, too. His story -- their story -- will make you weep, but you will also find it uplifting. It shows the very best of humanity in the very worst of circumstances. Like many survivors, Lale and Gita told few people their story after the war. They eventually made their way to Australia, where they raised a son and had a successful life. But when Gita died, Lale felt he could no longer carry the burden of their past alone. He chose to tell his story.

Your God is too small. We like God small. We prefer a God who is safe, domesticated, who thinks like we think, likes what we like, and whom we can manage, predict, and control. A small God is convenient. Practical. Manageable. The truth: God is big. Bigger than big. Bigger than all the words we use to say big. Ironically, many today seem turned off by the concept of an awesome, terrifyingly great God. We assume that a God you would need to fear is guilty of some kind of fault. For us, thinking of God as so infinitely greater and wiser than we are and who would cause us to tremble in his presence is a leftover relic from an oppressive, archaic view of religion. But what if this small version of God we've created is holding us back from the greatest experience of our lives - from genuine, confident, world-transforming faith? In Not God Enough, J. D. reveals how to discover a God who is big enough to handle your questions, doubts, and fears; is not silent; is worthy of worship; wants to take you from boring to bold in your faith; has a purpose and mission for you on earth; and is pursuing you right now. God is not just a slightly better, slightly smarter version of you. God is infinite and glorious, and an encounter with him won't just change the way you think about your faith. It'll change your entire life.

A revised and updated edition (with more than 70% new material) of the classic book about innate differences between boys and girls and how best to parent and teach girls and boys successfully, with new chapters on sexual orientation and on transgender and intersex kids. Back in 2005, the first edition of Why Gender Matters broke ground in illuminating the differences between boys and girls-how they perceive the world differently, how they learn differently, how they process emotions and take risks differently. Dr. Sax argued that in failing to recognize these hardwired differences between boys and girls, we ended up reinforcing damaging stereotypes, medicalizing misbehavior, and failing to help kids to reach their full potential. In the intervening decade, the world has changed, with an avalanche of new research which supports, deepens, and expands Dr. Sax's work. This revised and updated edition includes new findings about how boys and girls interact differently with social media and video games; a new discussion of research on gender non-conforming, LGB, and transgender kids, new findings about how girls and boys see differently, hear differently, and even smell differently; and new material about the medicalization of misbehavior.

Most of what you think you know about writing is useless. It's the harmful debris of your education - a mixture of half-truths, myths, and false assumptions that prevents you from writing well. Drawing on years of experience as a writer and teacher of writing, Verlyn Klinkenborg offers an approach to writing that will change the way you work and think. There is no gospel, no orthodoxy, no dogma in this book. What you'll find here isn't the way to write. Instead, you'll find a way to clear your mind of illusions about writing and discover how you write. Several Short Sentences About Writing is a book of first steps and experiments. They will revolutionize the way you think and perceive, and they will change forever the sense of your own authority as a writer. This is a book full of learning, but it's also a book full of unlearning - a way to recover the vivid, rhythmic, poetic sense of language you once possessed. An indispensable and unique book that will give you a clear understanding of how to think about what you do when you write and how to improve the quality of your writing.

In 1942, Europe remains in the relentless grip of war. Just beyond the tents of the Russian refugee camp she calls home, a young woman speaks her wedding vows. It's a decision that will alter her destinyand it's a lie that will remain buried until the next century.Since she was nine years old, Alina Dziak knew she would marry her best friend, Tomasz. Now fifteen and engaged, Alina is unconcerned by reports of Nazi soldiers at the Polish border, believing her neighbors that they pose no real threat, and dreams instead of the day Tomasz returns from college in Warsaw so they can be married. But little by little, injustice by brutal injustice, the Nazi occupation takes hold, and Alina's tiny rural village, its families, are divided by fear and hate. Then, as the fabric of their lives is slowly picked apart, Tomasz disappears. Where Alina used to measure time between visits from her beloved, now she measures the spaces between hope and despair, waiting for word from Tomasz and avoiding the attentions of the soldiers who patrol her parents' farm. But for now, even deafening silence is preferable to grief. Slipping between Nazi-occupied Poland and the frenetic pace of modern life, Kelly Rimmer creates an emotional and finely wrought narrative that weaves together two women's stories into a tapestry of perseverance, loyalty, love and honor. The Things We Cannot Say is an unshakable reminder of the devastation when truth is silencedand how it can take a lifetime to find our voice before we learn to trust it.

When a human team is sent to scout a few hundred light-years in front of the death wave, it encounters a civilization far in advance of our own, a civilization of machine intelligences.These sentient, intelligent machines have existed for eons and have survived earlier "death waves" - gamma-ray bursts from the core of the galaxy. They are totally self-sufficient, completely certain that the death wave cannot harm them, and utterly uninterested in helping to save other civilizations, whether organic or machine. But now that the humans have discovered them, they refuse to allow them to leave their planet, reasoning that other humans will inevitably follow if they learn of their existence.

[Read by Jennifer Wydra and Kyla Garcia] A powerful novel of friendship set in a traveling circus during World War II, The Orphan's Tale introduces two extraordinary women and their harrowing stories of sacrifice and survival.Sixteen-year-old Noa has been cast out in disgrace after becoming pregnant by a Nazi soldier and being forced to give up her baby. She lives above a small rail station, which she cleans in order to earn her keep. When Noa discovers a boxcar containing dozens of Jewish infants bound for a concentration camp, she is reminded of the child that was taken from her. And in a moment that will change the course of her life, she snatches one of the babies and flees into the snowy night.Noa finds refuge with a German circus, but she must learn the flying trapeze act so she can blend in undetected, spurning the resentment of the lead aerialist, Astrid. At first rivals, Noa and Astrid soon forge a powerful bond. But as the facade that protects them proves increasingly tenuous, Noa and Astrid must decide whether their friendship is enough to save one another -- or if the secrets that burn between them will destroy everything.

[Read by James Langton]In this poignant and curiously charming debut, a lovable widower embarks on a life-changing adventure.Sixty-nine-year-old Arthur Pepper lives a simple life. He gets out of bed at precisely 7:30 a.m., just as he did when his wife, Miriam, was alive. He dresses in the same gray slacks and mustard sweater vest, waters his fern, Frederica, and heads out to his garden.But on the one-year anniversary of Miriam's death, something changes. Sorting through Miriam's possessions, Arthur finds an exquisite gold charm bracelet he's never seen before. What follows is a surprising and unforgettable odyssey that takes Arthur from London to Paris and as far as India in an epic quest to find out the truth about his wife's secret life before they met -- a journey that leads him to find hope, healing, and self-discovery in the most unexpected places.Featuring an unforgettable cast of characters with big hearts and irresistible flaws, The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper is a joyous celebration of life's infinite possibilities.

In September 1926, the Honorable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher visits Sybil Sutherby, a school friend now living in Derbyshire as the confidential secretary to a novelist. Suspecting that something is seriously amiss, Sybil has asked Daisy to discretely investigate. Upon arrival, Daisy finds a household of relatives and would-be suitors living off the hospitality of Humphrey Birtwhistle, who had been supporting them through his thrice-yearly, pseudonymous Westerns. When he took ill, though, Sybil took over writing them while he recovered, only to see the sales increase. Now, she fears that someone in the household is poisoning Birtwhistle to keep him ill and Sybil writing the better-paying versions. But before Daisy can even get decently underway, Humphrey Birtwhistle dies under suspicious circumstances and Daisy now faces a death to untangle, a house full of suspects, and a Scotland Yard detective husband who is less than pleased at this turn of events.

This confessional self-help guide explores the complex emotional truth of what it's like when food, weight, and body image take priority over every other human impulse or action. Activist author Marissa LaRocca's revelatory tale includes her struggle with her secrets, including sexuality, and how she emerged as an outspoken advocate for gay rights and women's health issues. Many young women and girls struggle with the body image issues that engender eating disorders with elaborate rituals around food, binging, purging, and hiding it all while trying to maintain a face of normalcy to the world. Anorexia and bulimia have become major national health crises, with skyrocketing statistics indicating that between 3 and 5 percent of the population suffer anorexia nervosa alone. Sadly, many never attain the sense of being "normal" and deal with a lifetime of body image and self-esteem issues. This intimate account of courage and the search for truth and meaning will have you rooting for Marissa LaRocca as she unravels the emotional layers of her own battle with food, body image, and sexuality. Readers of this riveting memoir will relate to the coming-of-age story of a young woman confronting some of life's major issues while living, for a time, in two closets: one to hide her eating disorder and one to hide her sexuality and very identity. Echoes of Portia de Rossi's Unbearable Lightness resound in LaRocca's portrait of a life seemingly lived out in the open but, in truth, very much concealed. Through her inspiring triumphs and revelations, activist and author Marissa LaRocca invites readers to confront themselves. She asks, "What if, at the root of all 'disorders', is the refusal to acknowledge or permit certain feelings - feelings that, if witnessed, have the power to free their sufferers? To what extent are 'disorders' actually doorways to helping us understand the truth about our lives?" In addition to her personal story, LaRocca takes a close look at society's role in the development of eating disorders and other mental health challenges, establishing that the prevalence of such "illnesses" represent a collective yearning for connection, acceptance, and emotional nourishment among generations that are starving for so many things. Starving in Search of Me resolves with hope and an abundance of insights, tools, and resources to support eating disorder sufferers and members of the LGBTQ community alike. It's a head-on journey toward total self-acceptance that will nourish the spirit and inspire readers to embrace their differences and nurture their authentic selves.

"After all, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels." - Ann Richards Women have been instrumental in the success of American cinema since its very beginning. One of the first people to ever pick up a motion picture camera was a woman, as was the first screenwriter to win two Academy Awards, the inventor of the boom microphone, and the first person to be credited with the title film editor. Throughout the entire history of Hollywood women have been revolutionizing, innovating, and shaping how we make movies. Yet their stories are rarely shared. This is what film reporter Alicia Malone wants to change. Backwards and in Heels tells the history of women in film in a different way, with stories about incredible ladies who made their mark throughout each era of Hollywood, from the first women directors to iconic movie stars and present-day activists. Each story shares the inspiring accomplishments of women, while also highlighting the obstacles women have had to face. Backwards and in Heels combines research and exclusive interviews with influential women and men working in Hollywood today, such as Geena Davis, J.J. Abrams, Ava DuVernay, Octavia Spencer, America Ferrera, Paul Feig, and many more, as well as film professors, historians, and experts. Join Alicia as she champions Hollywood women of the past and present, and looks to the future with the hopes of leveling out the playing field.