Browse A-Z Authors: Ru-Rz

Eastern Kentucky, 1956. Life is hard and sweet for ten-year-old Icy Sparks. Orphaned as a baby but raised by adoring grandparents, she is a bright, curious child. Yet something strange is happening to her, something that she'd like to keep hidden. Try as she might, her secrets--those croaks, jerks, and spasms--keep slipping out. Her teachers think she's willful, her friends call her the "Frog Child." Exiled from the schoolroom, she spends time in a children's asylum where she learns about being different and teaches her doctors even more. Yet, it is not until Icy returns home that she really begins to flower through her friendship with the eccentric and obese Miss Emily. Under her tutelage, Icy takes her initial steps back into the world, including her first hilarious and heartbreaking misadventure with romance.Icy Sparks, the account of this wonderfully original and charming character's adventures and mishaps, introduces a fresh, quirky new voice in the tradition of such Southern writers as Harper Lee, Olive Ann Burns, and Eudora Welty.

New York Times bestselling author Gwyn Hyman Rubio's highly anticipated new novel. Love and Ordinary Creatures is told through the eyes of a cockatoo in love with his very human caretaker. Snatched in a net from his Australian homeland as a young parrot, Caruso has adapted to captivity and has learned all he knows of love from his previous owner, who was obsessively fixated on his childhood sweetheart. Now in his new home with the beautiful and talented Clarissa, Caruso has found both love and happiness--until a handsome stranger arrives in town and sets his sights on Clarissa.Smart, passionate, and wildly inventive, Caruso strives to put his human rival in his place before he loses Clarissa for good. And when a hurricane descends upon the coast, Caruso's love for Clarissa and his memories of freedom are tested as the storm threatens all that he holds dear. Set in the early 1990s in a quaint North Carolina seashore town, Love and Ordinary Creatures is an exquisite tale of the ways in which love and hope transcend species.

First published in 2005. Hailed as vivid and unforgettable by the New York Times Book Review, Gwyn Hyman Rubio's Icy Sparks dazzled readers, including Oprah, and became an acclaimed bestseller. Now Rubio offers another sweeping example of Southern storytelling at its finest with The Woodsman's Daughter. Set in post Civil War southern Georgia, this is the saga of Dalia Miller, a headstrong beauty who is determined to rise above the sins of her father, a shrewd turpentine farmer haunted by a devastating secret. Brilliantly evoking the majestic estates and humble shantytowns of a South in transition and filled with vibrant characters, this epic page-turner with a spirited heroine at its heart confirms Rubio as one of the Souths new treasures (Lexington Herald-Leader).

There is no right or wrong way to drink bourbon--in a cocktail, straight up, on the rocks, or with a splash of soda. You will never know which is your way until you try them all, and How to Be a Bourbon Badass will guide you on the path of your own bourbon adventure. How to Be a Bourbon Badass, captures the storied history of America's native spirit, explains the process of making liquid gold, and offers top-notch cocktail, dinner, and dessert recipes for the novice and connoisseur alike. From tales of legendary master distillers to stories of how lives were changed through newfound bourbon badass confidence, and from recipes for classics like the bourbon highball to fresh twists like strawberry bourbon lemonade with rosemary. Ruffenach shares behind-the-scenes tales from bourbon industry experts and rock stars. Your journey to becoming a bourbon badass begins here!

Autobiography; 176 pages. In the first chapter of this autobiography, you will find information about the author's roots and a general description of her extended family and the geographical location of such. Most of this book is written in short story format. Told within are the author's struggles with mental disease, addiction, and alcoholism, brought about in part by the relocation of her family. The move was forced upon the family. The reader is guided through tears, memories and laughter. The latter part of the book deals with how the author's family dealt with a serious illness. There is always hope, no matter how deep your misery. The author's deepest hope is that the reader will be able to relate to her words in some beneficial way.