It was one of the happiest days of Sara Ann’s life, it was spring break and her father bought a new boat. He wanted to surprise his daughter and take her on her first trip on a boat in the ocean. Sara lost her mother a few years ago to cancer, and her father took it hard and knew in his heart no other woman could ever fill that hole in his heart so he just focused on his only daughter Sara Ann, and made sure she never did without, and always put her first because Sara was very close to her mother, and he had not always been around because of working so many hours at his job and decided to do the best he could to raise her in a loving home so she could grow up and be the best person she could like her mother. Sara’s father bought the boat so he could spend more time with his daughter and let her see the beauty of the ocean even though it was short-lived. Sara’s father blindfolded his daughter and took her to his barn where he hid the boat from Sara for a surprise. When Sara entered the barn her father took off the blindfold and Sara said “It’s beautiful father.” Then her father said I’ve got another surprise and he took her by the hand around the other side of the boat and said “You can open your eyes now.” Sara cried tears of joy and said “That’s my name!” Her father chimed in and said, “I named the boat after you because when you were born it was the happiest day of your mom and I lives.” Sara gave her dad a hug and thanked him. Her father said, “Why don’t we take it for a spin?” Sara said, “That would be so cool!” “I can only be gone for an hour because I promised my friends I would go with them on our spring break.” Her father replied, “That’s fine I know you’re excited about going on this trip and there will always be more trips on the boat in the days to come.” “Remember, I was young once too and I could not wait to go on spring break with my friends so no big deal.” Sara’s father hooked up the boat to his truck and the two drove happily to the dock and set sail in the ocean on a clear beautiful sunny day. Even though Sara’s father read the stories about the Bermuda Triangle, he just thought they were all explainable and not mysterious disappearances as were written about in many books.

Drac Von Stoller brings more tales of suspense and horror from the series 31 Horrifying Tales From The Dead to give readers more nightmares. In this series the short story Dracula: The Legend Lives has been made into a short film that is available for sale on Amazon Video. Other tales deal with zombies, vampires, pirates, ghosts, poison, mystery, aliens, time travel and other tales to send shivers up and down your spine.

This book explores the improbable rise of medical hypnotism in Victorian Britain and its subsequent assimilation and neglect. It follows the careers of the ‘New Hypnotists’: Charles Lloyd Tuckey, John Milne Bramwell, George Kingsbury and Robert Felkin. This loosely knit group all trained with the Suggestion School of Nancy and published books on hypnotism. They had to confront the many public and medical prejudices against the trance state which had persisted after the scandalous disgrace of John Elliotson and medical mesmerism, fifty years before. Hypnotism was a highly contested technology and in the 1890s the debates about safety and utility were fought in the national newspapers as well as the medical journals. The new hypnotists took on the might of the medical institutions personified by Ernest Hart, Editor of the British Medical Journal. However their timing was propitious, as the rise of faith-healing forced the medical profession to confront the non-physical therapeutic aspects of the doctor-patient relationship. The hypnotic discourse was shaped by these developments, but also by the fascination of the general public, novelists, occultists, psychic investigators, educationalists and spiritualists in the myriad possibilities of the trance state. Despite growing interest in the prehistory of British psychology and talking therapies, and the recent challenges to the primacy of Freudian histories, there are few accounts of the development of British ‘eclectic therapy’. This book uses the New Hypnotists as a lens to examine Victorian medicine and society, exploring their role in establishing the term ‘psychotherapy,’ and legitimising medical hypnotism, a precursor of psychological therapies.

Perfect for fans of Alafair Burke and Megan Collins, Sarah Warburton's debut novel that explores the dangerous bond between sisters. When her sister goes missing, Zoe assumes it's just another one of her estranged sibling's stunts--but the danger is all too real. Zoe Hallett and her sister, Ava, are the precocious offspring of two pioneering scientists, but the sisters have been estranged for years. When Zoe reads a news story about Ava's mysterious disappearance, she assumes it's just another of her sister's twisted fictions, designed to blame Zoe and destroy the peaceful life she's created with her husband and beautiful stepdaughter in Houston. But Zoe's email is hacked to send threatening messages to Ava--and a more sinister picture begins to emerge. Zoe returns to her home state of Virginia to prove her innocence to the authorities, to her parents, and to Glenn, her ex-boyfriend and current brother-in-law. For the first time, Zoe begins to believe Ava is in grave danger, and when Glenn catches her searching for clues in Ava's home, she looks guiltier than ever--but maybe Glenn is not all he seems. The clues Zoe finds point to a bizarre link between Ava's disappearance and her mother's "research". Is there a secret someone is trying to protect? And would someone be willing to kill to protect it? As her sister's life hangs in the balance, Zoe draws on hidden reserves of strength and hope to save the sister she never thought she loved.

'Ghoulishly entertaining' Jacqueline Banerjee, Times Literary Supplement 'This is a great book for dipping into . . . the cases themselves are written engagingly and with appealing dramatisation of key events.' Kim Fleet, Crime Review A grisly book dedicated to the crimes, perversions and outrages of Victorian England, covering high-profile offences - such as the murder of actor William Terriss, whose stabbing at the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre in 1897 filled the front pages for many weeks - as well as lesser-known transgressions that scandalised the Victorian era. The tales include murders and violent crimes, but also feature scandals that merely amused the Victorians. These include the story of a teenage man who married an actress, only to be shipped off to Australia by his disgusted parents; and the Italian ice-cream man who only meant to buy his sweetheart a hat but ended up proposing marriage instead. When he broke it off, his fiancée's father sued him and the story was dubbed the 'Amusing Aberdeen Breach of Promise Case'. Also present is the gruesome story of the murder of Patrick O Connor who was shot in the head and buried under the kitchen flagstones by his lover Maria Manning and her husband, Frederick. The couple's subsequent trial caused a sensation and even author Charles Dickens attended the grisly public hanging. Drawing on a range of sources from university records and Old Bailey transcripts to national and regional newspaper archives, Michelle Morgan's research sheds new light on well-known stories as well as unearthing previously unknown incidents.

Covers the period from 1790 to 1905 in The Times of London.