PULPWOOD QUEEN BOOK CLUB JANUARY PICKS

PULPWOOD QUEEN BOOK CLUB JANUARY PICKS

January’s Official Pick

Work In Progress edited by Mandy Haynes

Work In Progress is a collection of excerpts of works in progress by several authors of The International Pulpwood Queen and Timber Guy Book Club Reading Nation followed by a description of each excerpt. Some of the works in progress are current, others are from manuscripts that have been put aside for months, or even years. Have you ever wondered how an author came up with the idea for a story? Or if there was a chapter deleted from one of your favorite novels in its final edits? Maybe the original ending was different than the one that was published... In Work In Progress, fifty-nine of our International Pulpwood Queen and Timber Guy Authors share the stories behind their works in progress with you.

January’s International Pick

Purple Lotus by Veena Rao

Tara moves to the American South three years after her arranged marriage to tech executive Sanjay. Ignored and lonely, Tara finds herself regressing back to childhood memories that have scarred her for life. When she was eight, her parents had left her behind with her aging grandparents and a schizophrenic uncle in Mangalore, while taking her baby brother with them to make a new life for the family in Dubai. Tara's memories of abandonment and isolation mirror her present life of loneliness and escalating abuse at the hands of her husband. She accepts the help of kind-hearted American strangers to fight Sanjay, only to be pressured by her patriarchal family to make peace with her circumstances. Then, in a moment of truth, she discovers the importance of self-worth--a revelation that gives her the courage to break free, gently rebuild her life, and even risk being shunned by her community when she marries her childhood love, Cyrus Saldanha.

January Bonus Book

Market Street Madam by Randi Samuelson-Brown

Market Street Madam tells the story of Annie Ryan, a woman who is running a second-rate brothel in 1890s Denver with an eye toward expansion. By chance she encounters Lydia Chambers, a society woman suffering from a laudanum habit and a bad marriage, who owns a prized property on the infamous Market Street. Annie's fortunes at the brothel turn on her niece Pearl, a pretty young girl swept up in Denver's underworld of jealousy, booze, and vice--until murder stalks the good-time girls and puts everyone's future in doubt. A rollicking tale of blurred lines, flowing booze, played-out miners and upstairs girls, Market Street Madam delivers a compelling look at the intrigues of the Wild West, where women were enterprising and justice could be had . . . for a price.

January Bonus Book

River, Sing Out by James Wade

Attempting to escape his abusive father and generations of cyclical poverty, young Jonah Hargrove joins the mysterious River--a teenage girl carrying thousands of dollars in stolen meth--and embarks on a southern gothic odyssey through the East Texas river bottoms. They are pursued by local drug kingpin John Curtis and his murderous enforcer, Dakota Cade, with whom River was romantically involved. But Cade and Curtis have their own enemies, as their relationship with the cartel controlling their meth supply begins to sour. Keeping tabs on everyone is the Thin Man, a silent assassin who values consequence over mercy. Each person is keeping secrets from the others--deadly secrets that will be exposed in savage fashion as their final paths collide and all are forced to come to terms with their choices, their circumstances, and their own definition of God.