Holding Back The Tears

Steph’s life is thrown into turmoil when her past catches up with her. All the abuse she tried to hide, she is now forced to confront. Will she be mentally strong enough to survive a court case? Her heart is confused, unsure who to turn to and who to trust, doubting herself and her choices. How will Steph, with her ambition to further her career, manage to protect her family? Brett and Keith had always helped her in her past. Can her biker friends save Steph again, or will trouble just follow them? Elizabeth was growing up with questions about her father. All the secrets Steph had tried to protect her daughter from are they secrets no more? Can Elizabeth handle the truth? Or will losing her best friend push her over the edge? Brett and Steph share one last night before Brett disappears on the run from the law. Adrien and Steph’s friendship grows stronger as they raise Steph’s new daughter, Stacey. With more secrets, will Stacey ever know the identity of her birth father? Will Steph ever find her true love? Will she ever see Brett again?

BEYOND TEARS is based on the true story of James and Rosanna Steele and their six children when faced with experiencing the devastation of the 1900 Galveston, Texas Hurricane. It remains the worst National disaster to hit the United States of America in the loss of life.

When I lost my four-year-old granddaughter due to a car accident, my world came to a complete stop. My friends gave me books on grief, but nothing I read helped me, so I decided to write this book. It is raw and tells everything I went through, with no filter. I wanted to bring the process of grieving out into the open and not dance around topics that others don’t want to discuss, such as anger, severe depression, and thoughts of suicide. Grieving is a series of missteps, misinterpretations, and good intentions gone awry. This book is about not only grieving but also healing, which is sometimes just as difficult. Letting go of guilt and other burdens we sometimes carry can be daunting, but if we try really hard, we can find our way through to the light at the end of the tunnel.

In 2015, Benjamin Villegas traveled to Texas in an attempt to write the biography of a music group that could have changed the history of rock: ELPASO, a Chicano band from the U.S.-Mexico border with a punk sensibility, a long since-defunct crew, and little left to remember it by but a suitcase of fanzines and one-off recordings. This is the story of one of the many bands that will never appear in rock n’ roll history books, but is at the core of the scene; a band that earned its stripes from sweaty fans and self-taught rock aficionados in basements, garages, and small venues across the country. This is the story of two kids who came together to embrace the punk ethos of the 80’s and be a part of the rock n’ roll revolution sweeping the US, a world of the Ramones, Black Flag, and, of course, ELPASO.

The story takes up where “Amelia’s Secrets” left off; after the murder trial held in Jacksonville, Florida where the accused, great-great-grandson of President Thomas Jefferson, T. J. Eppes murderer of one of his best friends and father of six children walks out of the courtroom a free man. He returns to Amelia Island there to carry on life as usual with his beautiful young bride Katie, expecting their first child, only to find life for her to be a daily trial by a jury of her peers; an impossible situation in the end. Our protagonist John Whitner describes in detail not only their lives culminating in the great hurricane of 1898, which nearly devastates the island but through the lives of the Carnegies of Cumberland Island, Mrs. Leddy owner and operator of the Florida House Hotel and her only child Grace from age eight through her progression to adulthood, marriage, babies and widowhood at the young age of twenty one. John, himself reveals his journey through all this, his relationship with Pauline; it’s ups and downs, a new woman in his life (or women) as well as his passion for photography in the many places he visits, Jekyl Island, Charleston, S. C. during the earthquake of 1886 and Chicago’s World’s fair of 1893. Meticulous research and beautiful descriptions bring nineteenth century Amelia Island to life. With creative flair, Ms. Carter-de Vries uses the first person narrative of her storyteller, John Whitner, to recreate the turbulence of natural disasters and society’s mores and make the past inhabitants of Amelia Island walk off the pages. Whether you’re a visitor to the island or a life-long resident, you will find much to enjoy in Carter-de Vries’ Golden Years, Silver Tears. Karen White New York Times bestselling author THE TIME BETWEEN, NAL/Penguin Publishing Group June 2013

In an ancient world of fantasy and magic, good battles two evils. The chosen of Light and Darkness battle for the future of Sho're, and the people of Brian's Loft.

Set in a country where being gay is punishable by law, These Letters End in Tears is the heart-wrenching forbidden love story of a Christian girl with a rebellious heart and a Muslim girl leading a double life Bessem notices Fatima for the first time on the soccer field—muscular and focused, she’s the only woman playing and seems completely at ease. When Fatima chases a rogue ball in her direction, Bessem freezes, mesmerized by the athlete’s charm and beauty. One playful wink from Fatima, and Bessem knows her life will never be the same. In Cameroon, a country where same-sex relationships are punishable by law, the odds are stacked against Bessem and Fatima from the start. And when Fatima’s older brother, a staunch Muslim, finds out about their affair, he intervenes by physically assaulting them, an incident that precedes a police raid at the only gay bar in town. After spending days in jail, Fatima goes missing without a trace, and Bessem is left with only rumors of her whereabouts. Has Fatima been sentenced to an unknown prison? Has she been banished from her community, or married off, as some have suggested? Or something even more sinister? Thirteen years later, Bessem is now a university professor leading a relatively quiet life, occasionally and secretly dating other women. However, she has never forgotten Fatima. After spotting a mutual friend for the first time in years—the last person who may have seen Fatima—Bessem embarks on a winding search for her lost love.

A rare first-person account that combines a journalist’s skilled reporting with the raw emotion of a younger brother’s heartfelt testimony of what his family endured after his eldest brother killed a man and was sentenced to life in prison. At the age of nine, Issac J. Bailey saw his hero, his eldest brother, taken away in handcuffs, not to return from prison for thirty-two years. Bailey tells the story of their relationship and of his experience living in a family suffering from guilt and shame. Drawing on sociological research as well as his expertise as a journalist, he seeks to answer the crucial question of why Moochie and many other young black men—including half of the ten boys in his own family—end up in the criminal justice system. What role do poverty, race, and faith play? What effect does living in the South, in the Bible Belt, have? And why is their experience understood as an acceptable trope for black men, while white people who commit crimes are never seen in this generalized way? My Brother Moochie provides a wide-ranging yet intensely intimate view of crime and incarceration in the United States, and the devastating effects on the incarcerated, their loved ones, their victims, and society as a whole. It also offers hope for families caught in the incarceration trap: though the Bailey family’s lows have included prison and bearing the responsibility for multiple deaths, their highs have included Harvard University, the White House, and a renewed sense of pride and understanding that presents a path forward.