Psychic Clair Ivars has a flair for reading tarot cards, yet a total blind spot when it comes to predicting her own future - especially matters of the heart. Which might explain why she's surprised to find herself accidentally engaged to vodka magnate Jack Heron after knowing him for only a few hours. What it doesn't explain, however, is an increasingly strange series of events... and it definitely doesn't explain the peculiar way Clair keeps thinking about Jack's business partner, the tall, dark, mysterious and infuriatingly sexy Mike...

A surprising, funny and heartfelt novel that shows how home and family can be found in the most unusual of places When lost soul Emily Tomlin a.k.a. Andes Lane moves into a tranquil houseboat on Seattle lake, she hopes to put an end to nine years of tireless travelling. But it's not long before her life is being turned upside down again, this time by her landlord, Jay, and his extraordinarily gifted but equally infuriating ten-year-old son, Chase. When Jay is sent down and Andes reluctantly agrees to accompany Chase on his quest to Sunnyside, Queens for the summer, she's forced to square up to the secrets and lies buried deep in her own past. With romance blossoming and a newly emerging peace of mind, has Andes found her true home at last?

In life you should use your talents. Right? But what if your main talent - and obsession - is for lifting pretty, expensive objects and dropping them into your handbag? Melanie knows she's got to stop, and she will. She's just waiting for the right moment. The problem is, she's just too damn good at theft. Maybe she needs to get caught? But then when Drew, sexy, caring, sweet - and a loss-prevention lawyer with a peculiar aversion to the light-fingered in life - comes her way, her day of reckoning could be closer than she expected.

How debates over secrecy and transparency in politics during the eighteenth century shaped modern democracy   Does democracy die in darkness, as the saying suggests? This book reveals that modern democracy was born in secrecy, despite the widespread conviction that transparency was its very essence.   In the years preceding the American and French revolutions, state secrecy came to be seen as despotic—an instrument of monarchy. But as revolutionaries sought to fashion representative government, they faced a dilemma. In a context where gaining public trust seemed to demand transparency, was secrecy ever legitimate? Whether in Philadelphia or Paris, establishing popular sovereignty required navigating between an ideological imperative to eradicate secrets from the state and a practical need to limit transparency in government. The fight over this—dividing revolutionaries and vexing founders—would determine the nature of the world’s first representative democracies.   Unveiling modern democracy’s surprisingly shadowy origins, Carter reshapes our understanding of how government by and for the people emerged during the Age of Revolutions.

Ava Wilder s home in small-town Iowa is her sanctuary. A talented sketch artist with severe agoraphobia, Ava spends her days drawing a far more adventurous life than her invisible disability allows. Until she receives a package from London, explaining that she has inherited her Aunt Beverly s entire estate on condition that she lives in Bev s West End flat for a year. Once overseas, Ava wonders if she s simply swapped one prison for another. The streets and shops are intimidating, and Bev s home appears to be a drop-in center for local eccentrics. Worst of all, Bev left a list of impossible provisos to be overseen by her quirky, attractive solicitor. Ava is expected to go out to experience clubs, pubs, and culture; to visit Big Ben, Hyde Park, and the London Eye. After years of viewing the world through a pane of glass, she s at the messy, complicated center of it. As exhilarated as she is terrified, will she be able to step up, step out, and claim the life she was meant for? In an insightful, poignant novel, Mary Carter delves deep into self-discovery and the meaning of courage, exploring the fears that serve to protect us until life calls us to connect at last."

I'm just the messenger. Please, don't kill me. . . Don't hate me because I'm psychic. . .everybody else already does. My name's Clair Ivers and these days my "gift" seems more like a booby prize. It all started when this crazy woman tried to bribe me into skewing a reading to warm her future sister-in-law's cold feet. Then the prospective sister-in-law threatened to kill herself at the altar if I didn't give her a phony reading saying she should break off the engagement. Oh, and did I mention she ran out, leaving her three-carat rock of a ring right there on my table? So what's an honest woman to do? Find the man who belongs to the ring, of course. And boy, have I found him. The minute I lay eyes on Jack Heron, I know he's the one. . .for me, that is. The problem is making him realize it once he finds out that I may be responsible for the flight of his fiancee. At least his grandmother likes me. Of course she thinks I'm someone else. And then there's the best man who keeps calling me for dates. . .and stock tips. Between the people who think I'm someone else, the people who wish I were, and the people who just want a bead on the winning Powerball numbers, I'm seriously considering packing in my deck for good. But not until I throw caution to the wind and make a play for my very own Jack of Hearts. . ."

A surprise trip to Barcelona with her boyfriend, Jake, seems like the perfect antidote to Grace Sawyer's current woes. The city is dazzling and unpredictable, but the biggest surprise for Grace is discovering who arranged and paid for the vacation. Carrie Ann wasn't just Grace's foster sister. Clever, pretty, and mercurial, she was her best friend--until everything went terribly wrong. Now, as she flees an abusive marriage, Carrie Ann has turned to the one person she hopes will come through for her. Despite her initial misgivings, Grace wants to help. But then Carrie Ann and Jake both go missing. Stunned and confused, Grace begins to realize how much of herself she's kept from Jake--and how much of Carrie Ann she never understood. Soon Grace is baited into following a trail of scant clues across Spain, determined to find the truth, even if she must revisit her troubled past to do it. . . Mary Carter's intriguing novel delves into the complexities of childhood bonds, the corrosive weight of guilt and blame, and all the ways we try--and often fail--to truly know the ones we love. Praise for Mary Carter "A touching novel." --"Publishers Weekly "on "The Things I Do For You" "This is guaranteed to become one of the books on your shelf that you'll want to read again." --"The Free Lance-Star "on "The Pub Across the Pond"