Diabetes in Fiction

Melanie Summers has something to prove! Being a zoologist is her dream and the only thing standing in the way of her going on an African expedition is her father and his fear. So she strikes a deal. She has to spend a full month in the Wyoming wilderness and show her father she can handle being in a remote area while managing her Type 1 diabetes before he’ll agree to fund the expedition to Africa and allow her to go. But her daddy isn’t the only one convinced she’ll fail… But she’s not about to let any man underestimate what she can do. Especially not the sexy rodeo cowboy she’s hired to help get her through the month in the wilderness. Yes, he knows what he’s doing. But so does she! Yes, he’s ruggedly handsome…well, he can’t help that, can he? But no sexy cowboy is going to keep her down! Stoney Buxton needs to raise cash fast to save the family ranch after a barn fire injured his father and left the family finances in ruin. Re-entering the rodeo circuit seems like the best way to get the money he needs. That is until Melanie Summers shows up at his ranch flashing easy money. To everyone else, Melanie’s offer seems like the answer to all his prayers. But one look at her long legs and pouting lips and Stoney knows this high society gal is going to be nothing but trouble…for his cowboy heart.

In outward form, NUMBER9DREAM is a Dickensian coming-of-age journey: Young dreamer Eiji Miyake, from remote rural Japan, thrust out on his own by his sister’s death and his mother’s breakdown, comes to Tokyo in pursuit of the father who abandoned him. Stumbling around this strange, awesome city, he trips over and crosses—through a hidden destiny or just monstrously bad luck—a number of its secret power centers. Suddenly, the riddle of his father’s identity becomes just one of the increasingly urgent questions Eiji must answer. Why is the line between the world of his experiences and the world of his dreams so blurry? Why do so many horrible things keep happening to him? What is it about the number 9? To answer these questions, and ultimately to come to terms with his inheritance, Eiji must somehow acquire an insight into the workings of history and fate that would be rare in anyone, much less in a boy from out of town with a price on his head and less than the cost of a Beatles disc to his name.

Following a scalding row with her mother, fifteen-year-old Holly Sykes slams the door on her old life. But Holly is no typical teenage runaway: a sensitive child once contacted by voices she knew only as ‘the radio people,’ Holly is a lightning rod for psychic phenomena. Now, as she wanders deeper into the English countryside, visions and coincidences reorder her reality until they assume the aura of a nightmare brought to life. For Holly has caught the attention of a cabal of dangerous mystics—and their enemies. But her lost weekend is merely the prelude to a shocking disappearance that leaves her family irrevocably scarred. This unsolved mystery will echo through every decade of Holly’s life, affecting all the people Holly loves—even the ones who are not yet born. A Cambridge scholarship boy grooming himself for wealth and influence, a conflicted father who feels alive only while reporting from occupied Iraq, a middle-aged writer mourning his exile from the bestseller list—all have a part to play in this surreal, invisible war on the margins of our world. From the medieval Swiss Alps to the nineteenth-century Australian bush, from a hotel in Shanghai to a Manhattan townhouse in the near future, their stories come together in moments of everyday grace and extraordinary wonder.

Shane loves her but is afraid of her sickness. They’ve been together for years, but have grown apart. Even though they constantly fight, he clings to her as much as he can, because he’s afraid to let her go. Drew loves her because she seems to understand him. She’s beautiful and open, exciting, and his best friend. But he knows her heart belongs to Shane, no matter what she tries to believe. She isn’t ready for him. Or is she? She is confused and battling with every aspect of her life. Her relationship with her mother is volatile; her father is calmly holding her emotions together; her disease is taking over her body and her life; and her passionate relationships with men are simply stressing her out. Will she put her unpredictable emotions in check before she loses everything?

Celebrities hold zero interest for photographer Jo Wilder. That’s a problem, since snapping pics of the stars is how the pretty paparazza pays the rent. So when Jo attempts to catch a money shot atop the broad shoulders of a helpful bystander, the only thing she notices about the stranger she straddles is that he’s seriously hot. Only later does Jo learn that he’s also Micah Sinclair–one of rock’s notorious bad boys…  Soon Jo is on the verge of getting fired for missing a Micah Sinclair exclusive. Until she’s suddenly being pursued by the heartthrob himself. But how can she be sure the musician’s mind-blowing kisses are the real deal? Her colleagues claim he’s a media whore, gambling on some free PR. But something has Jo hoping Micah’s feeling the same powerful pull that she does. A pull so strong, she can’t resist becoming his latest love, even if it means she might become the media’s latest victim . . .

It is Midsummer’s Eve. Three young friends meet in a wood to act out an elaborate masque. But unknown to them, they are being watched. With a bullet each, all three are murdered. Soon afterwards, one of Inspector Wallander’s colleagues is found murdered. Is this the same killer, and what could the connection be? In this investigation, Wallander is always, tantalisingly, One Step Behind.

On the afternoon of October 12, 1990, my twin brother, Thomas, entered the Three Rivers, Connecticut, public library, retreated to one of the rear study carrels, and prayed to God the sacrifice he was about to commit would be deemed acceptable. . . . One of the most acclaimed novels of our time, Wally Lamb’s I Know This Much Is True is a story of alienation and connection, devastation and renewal, at once joyous, heartbreaking, poignant, mystical, and powerfully, profoundly human.

Temporarily grounded combat pilot Molly Markham didn’t come to Sugar Falls to get serious about a man she barely knows! But when Kaleb Chatterson becomes her unexpected hero, she agrees to date the billionaire software developer to keep their secret from getting out. Except the sexy brainiac—and her pretend boyfriend—is fast turning into the man of her dreams…

Isaac Montgomery is a millionaire, a murderer, and high society’s latest novelty. After all he’s been through, it should take more than a prima ballerina with a cut-glass accent to get under his skin. But when Isaac meets Lizzie Olusegun-Keynes, he doesn’t just lose his cool. He f$*king melts. After a recent diabetes diagnosis, Lizzie is losing control of her body, her career—and, it seems, her desires. She shouldn’t want a man as coarse and cruel as Isaac, but the lust between them burns just as bright as their hatred. And when Lizzie’s beloved brother is threatened, the issue is taken out of her hands. Whether she wants to or not, she will pursue Isaac; her brother’s safety depends on it. There’s just one problem: she’s starting to fall for the brooding, secretly sweet ex-con. The ex-con she must betray.

Rock climbing is now a blood sport. Detective Inspector Nick Dixon’s former climbing partner, Jake Fayter, is dead. Killed in a fall whilst practising a new route on High Rock, Cheddar Gorge. Convinced that Jake would not have made such a simple mistake, Nick Dixon starts digging and uncovers a web of intrigue and criminal activity that will rock the sleepy seaside town of Burnham-on-Sea to its core. As the body count rises, Dixon is forced to break every rule in the book and put his own life on the line to bring the killer out into the open. A fast paced crime thriller that will leave you gasping for breath, AS THE CROW FLIES is a spine tingling introduction for DI Nick Dixon and a spectacular debut novel from crime fiction writer, Damien Boyd.

These stories, all set in nearby towns in the Alabama Black Belt a swath of dark soil that runs west to east through the central part of the state explore the history, culture, and human spirit of the people who live there, and those that came before them and were shaped by the same rich and corrupted geography. In the title story, a teenage girl wants desperately to escape her self-destructive mother and comes to realize the hay-bale art she can see from their house may hold a key to her future, if she can divine it. The novella ‘Playing War’ tells the story of a wife who’s just learned the hunting accident her husband was involved in years earlier was not exactly an accident. ‘Haints at Noon,’ written in the form of a 1930s slave narrative, tells the story of a couple trying to endure that ‘peculiar institution.’ The past and present are joined here in stories that demonstrate the never-ending struggle for understanding and connection.

Dr. Cameran Young knew her assignment wouldn’t be easy. As lead biologist on the Environment Impact Assessment team, her findings would determine the future of a large mining project in the northern Canadian bush. She expected rough conditions and hostile miners–but she didn’t expect to find a dead body her first day on the job. Former SAS Sergeant Daniel Fox forged a career as a helicopter pilot, working as far from the rest of the human race as possible. The thrill of flying makes his civilian life bearable, and he lives by his mantra: don’t get involved. But when he’s charged with transporting the biologist to her research vessel, he can’t help but get involved in the murder investigation–and with Cameran, who awakens emotions he’s desperate to suppress. In the harsh and rugged wilderness, Daniel and Cameran must battle their intense and growing attraction while keeping ahead of a killer who will stop at nothing to silence her…