A woman once emailed to invite me to join her book club for lunch at a country club in Malibu. She offered to reserve a parking spot for me near the front door. It was a lovely gesture, but it would have been a 2,100-mile drive.

The trip would have taken four days, maybe five. I stop a lot for Diet Cokes.

Another reader wrote expressing ...Read more

Joelle Babula’s debut novel "Infidelity Rules" is — yes! — a captivating read and a delicious, upbeat escape, but it is even more. Its engaging and iconoclastic protagonist breaks the rules with her unexpected depth of interiority that expands the sometimes-breezy genre of romance novels. Well-drawn characters, lots of humor, and insights ...Read more

Some scars don’t fade and some threats don’t disappear. They evolve, adapt and burrow into the cracks of modern life, waiting …

These thrillers don’t just tell stories, but rather dig up what we thought was buried — ideologies dressed in new skin, Cold War ghosts whispering through modern politics, conspiracies that fester until ...Read more

It’s 1944 in Nazi-occupied France, and Resistance operative Charlotte Denneau is quite literally a woman on the run. Pursued by the Gestapo through moonlit fields and sleepy villages, Charlotte carries critical secrets that could influence the impending Allied invasion. Across the English Channel, Lieutenant Philippe Gerard – a French pilot ...Read more

Our primary care doctor announced he is joining a concierge practice and invited us to follow him. We were excited, thinking this meant luxurious fluffy white robes in the exam room and 500-thread-count cotton sheets on the table instead of that crinkly deli wrap paper.

Visions of coffee bars danced in our heads. The concierge practice could ...Read more

From its very inception, "Taking the Stairs & Liking It" has a remarkable origin story: it was inspired by a chance 2005 conversation with none other than President Jimmy Carter. Author Lauren Speeth, PhD, took to heart the nuggets of wisdom Carter shared with her during that serendipitous meeting, and over the years she developed those insights...Read more

At the intersection of metaphysics and quantum mechanics lies a vast area of exploration for curious minds. Among these explorations, perhaps one of the most compelling is how our ancient spiritual traditions can be reframed in the context of modern science, where we can examine and understand them in new ways.

Joseph L. Bensinger’s "The ...Read more

Thanks to their miles-high vantage point, aviators develop an outsider’s perspective of life on the ground, like the Apollo 17 astronauts who saw the earth looking like a “blue marble.”

In his memoir, former U.S. Air Force and airline pilot Richard Hess takes the broad view. "High Flight: A Pilot’s Journey Through Life" is an all-...Read more

We had a good-size crowd together this week. Three out-of-town grands and six grands who live in town, met up for three consecutive days. We rotated from house to house to house so that no one house would be singled out as a disaster area.

Due to the size, volume and rapid movement of the group, my intelligence gathering is often limited to ...Read more

If you can’t swing a trip to the Big Apple (or even your local community theater), don’t fret.

We’ve got the next best thing, and let me tell you, these books deliver the same vibe as some of Broadway’s buzziest, weirdest and most unforgettable productions.

The People Who Report More Stress by Alejandro Varela

(If You Wanted to Watch...Read more

Too often, period-related issues are shrugged off or treated with one-size-fits-all solutions, leaving women feeling frustrated and unheard. Heidi Moretti’s mission is to change that narrative. In "Period Fix," she asserts that women have far more options to address period problems than simply taking synthetic hormones or “putting up with it...Read more

Only a small fraction of Americans know what it’s truly like to fight a war and live with its aftermath. Les Carroll’s novel "This Troubled Ground" bridges that gap by taking readers from the somber, cold tarmac of Dover Air Force Base to the battle-scarred landscapes of Afghanistan.

Inspired by true events from Carroll’s own military ...Read more

Hydration has officially become the cure for whatever ails us.

Feeling sluggish? Hydrate! Dry skin? Hydrate! Joints hurt? Hydrate! High blood pressure? Hydrate! Ingrown toenail? Hydrate! Don’t know what to make for dinner? Hydrate!

To join the wave of adequate hydration, one of our daughters thoughtfully gifted me with a pink XXL insulated ...Read more

"Night of the Bear" by Alan Cockrell and Richard Hess is a suspenseful tale of revenge and military aggression, reminiscent of Tom Clancy’s earliest Cold War thrillers. A covert meeting off the coast of Long Island between Russian Intelligence and a highly placed asset, with links to the highest levels of the U.S. government, discusses a ...Read more

A unique spiritual guide for Christians that blends Scripture and personal revelation is the focus of "I Am: the First and the Last" by Delon Jackson.

In this intimate look at the wonders and mysteries of God, the Bible and the nature of Heaven, Jackson meditates on a wide variety of Christian precepts and doctrine, all with a distinctly ...Read more

Ah, summertime. When the living is easy. Kids out of school, family vacations in full swing, honeymoons and girl trips galore.

Perhaps you are reading this as you dig your toes into white sand, or you’re currently curled up by the campfire after a long day of hiking and barbecues. Lucky. I could be achieving a summer glow and sipping ...Read more

The man of the house is tall, lean and so bald that his head shines almost as much as his smile. He worked law enforcement all his career. As a state trooper, he once rescued the Beatles from crazed fans after a St. Louis concert.

He worked for the federal government as well, something to do with organized crime and exploding body parts. I don�...Read more

Family legacy has long captivated our imagination, whether in the form of domestic thrillers like "The Family Upstairs' by Lisa Jewell; classic stage plays like Shakespeare’s "Hamlet"; sweeping historical epics like Jeffrey Eugenides’s "Middlesex"; or intimate personal narratives like Louisa May Alcott’s "Little Women." From hidden ...Read more

In "Falling Angels," the third book in the Maxx King Thriller series, John H. Thomas pushes his high-octane storytelling to its most ambitious scale yet. The action opens in the chaos of Operation Anaconda, where elite operative Maxx King is betrayed, wounded and left for dead in the mountains of Afghanistan. As Maxx regroups with a Green Beret ...Read more

Introducing Donovan Cross, a seasoned secret agent whose latest mission takes him home after three decades away — but this is no peaceful return. Instead, it’s the spark that ignites a tense, high-stakes thriller filled with political intrigue, buried secrets, and personal reckoning. With its smart pacing, vivid setting, and complex ...Read more