Joe Keen and Ana Urbanek have been a couple for a long time, with all the requisite lulls and temptations, yet they remain unmarried and without children or a mortgage, as their Midwestern values (and parents) seem to require. Now on the cusp of forty, they are both working jobs that they're not even sure they believe in anymore, but with significantly varying returns. Ana is successful; Joe is floundering; both are in limbo, caught somewh ...
Whether from established authors or by writers new to fiction, the short stories in this volume explore life as change, using Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 as the lens. The writers come from different backgrounds, perspectives, and levels of familiarity with the short story, but what ties them together is a willingness to creatively explore the raw and more uncomfortable dimensions of life–big events and small happenings–all bound up by a recognit ...
The time is post-World War II; the place is the United States and sporadically several «at-risk» foreign countries. The story is about a young scientist, Richard, who believes that the origins of violence and warfare can be found in the early life experiences of individuals. To test this belief, Richard insists he must have firsthand research experience, which means traveling to foreign countries to observe local populations under stress and to ...
In this witty and ironic novel, Melissa and Dave claim to love each other, but clash as to how the relationship should proceed. Their predicament is complicated by Beth, who brazenly asserts her own amorous intentions. Add a provocative element of mystery, and the result is a subtly subversive comedy about contemporary romance. ...
Wind-Borne Sister narrates the story of a young woman's journey from grief and an uncertain future into a sense of purpose, hope, and identity. Along Brie's travels, the people and resources she encounters contribute to her unfolding sense of call and her growing, vibrant faith. As she is drawn deeper into a risk-filled mystery, she is blessed by the aid of Susannah, a wise, blind artist; precocious seven-year-old Lily Mae; and the ten ...
Ted Peterson, son of former missionaries to Guatemala, returns to that country to solve the mystery of his father's disappearance. Caught up in a culture of violence and deadly secrets, what he learns is as much about himself as his father. ...
Theo Cross: A Life Lived under Grace is the touching story of a pastor's life as he grows in God's grace over the course of his stay in a hospital where he is being treated for cancer. The story recounts the central characters awakening to God's call to the pastoral ministry, the desire to deepen in his understanding of God, faith, hope, and a host of associated issues with following Christ as a disciple. The story discloses the c ...
These novellas track three meaning-making, moral skirmishes: a thickening tennis pro on the Florida-New York teaching circuit grapples with weakening personal commitments and a fading serve; a dispirited short-term Coast Guard reservist struggles with the ambiguity of an accidental murder on an icebreaker heading to the arctic; and an American vacuum sewers entrepreneur and a local archeologist explore the exploitation of women, art, and sexual ...
Echoes of Evil rejoins Deacon Coburn and company in a new adventure that picks up storylines and characters from Days of Purgatory and Shadows of Revenge. Joys and sorrows weave through this mosaic narrative, for the pursuit of justice extracts a great price as gripping scenarios unfold and secrets are confronted in the midst of upheaval. True to his sojourner outlook, the whiskey-sipping philosopher from Conoy Creek always comes to the aid of ...
