A Carpenter's Daughter is the story of the difficulties and rewards of the educational system for one who was not meant to go through it. The single most reliable predictor of whether someone will earn a BA is whether at least one of their parents has one-yet, today, there are an increasing number of first-generation college students. A Carpenter's Daughter is both a memoir of the author's experiences growing up, going to school, and becoming an academic and a thoughtful commentary on the meaning of class in American culture. By connecting her own story with ideas from scholarly works on class and identity, Christopher shows how her individual experiences reflect common struggles that people of working-class background face when their education, profession, income, and lifestyles change. This work reminds us forcefully that "moving up" isn't necessarily good and that changing one's class isn't as simple as going to class or even becoming the teacher of the class.--Sherry Linkon, author of Teaching Working Class The work is stellar, merging the tangled and complex webs of social mobility through education in ways that leave lots of loose ends dangling just the way it should. No pretty bows adorning carefully wrapped packages here. No straight and narrow trajectory toward a mainstream version of success. Instead, readers will be pulled along by nuanced narratives portraying the warped nature of society's construction of success and a careful crafting of the book in its entirety as a disjointed text presenting shards of a life that can never be visible in a tidied-up tale.--Stephanie Jones, University of Georgia

It's 1390 - a time when a woman had no right to choose much of anything - especially her husband. Randalyn Douglas, a 20-year old beauty who is too smart and independent for her own good, dreams of a more altruistic life, teaching children to read. But when the taxes are raised on her family's farm, her foolish father marries her off to a previous lord's rich son. All the while Randalyn dreams of a handsome, winsome knight she met at a jousting tournament. Sir Jamie Christianson shares her dreams of making the world a better place and they fall madly in love. But Jamie is hiding a deep, dark secret. It's only a matter of time before this secret comes to light, and Randalyn must decide whether to leave her husband, forgive her father or stay with her lover.

Welcome to structured improvisation, where there's a plan in place...but still plenty of room to play! Learn three methods for sewing together rectangles, squares, strips, and even the tiniest fabric scraps to create new yardage; then use the resulting scrappy fabrics in a dozen dazzling step-by-step quilt patterns. Start by working with just one color at a time to get the hang of improv piecing. Soon you'll progress to mixing colors and prints in scrap-packed quilts that will give a happy home to every piece of fabric you've ever saved!

In the small mining village of Meryen, a dark secret lurks... Amy Lewarne finds her life changed forever when she finds her brother, Toby, dead – and trouble follows when Titus Kivell, the head of a powerful yet belligerent family, puts his son Sol in Toby's place. Despite his wild and formidable nature, Amy is inexplicably drawn to Sol, as he is to her. But will his family ties be the ruin of her? Book One in the Meryen series – a Cornish saga perfect for fans of Poldark, Dilly Court and Val Wood Note: previously published as Keeping Echoes

Ernest, Isabel and Grace Munday were blessed with childhoods full of fun and laughter, but the coming of the First World War will change their lives forever. Tom Munday, a skilled carpenter, is more than content with his lot in life: he's been blessed with a fine wife and three wonderful children. But when war breaks out, his firstborn, Ernest, is called upon to join the army. Tom's eighteen-year-old daughter Isabel finds the path of true love does not run smoothly in London's poor East End. And the youngest, fifteen-year-old Grace, wilful and headstrong, finds herself drawn down a path she never wished to embark on, and the consequences are far worse than she could ever have imagined.