Bittersweet, funny and touching, Larry McMurtry's The Desert Rose is the story of Harmony, a Las Vegas showgirl. At night she's a lead dancer in a gambling casino; during the day she raises peacocks. She's one of a dying breed of dancers, faced with fewer and fewer jobs and an even bleaker future. Yet she maintains a calm cheerfulness in that arid neon landscape of supermarkets, drive-in wedding chapels, and all-night casinos. While Harmony's star is fading, her beautiful, cynical daughter Pepper's is on the rise. But Harmony remains wistful and optimistic through it all. She is the unexpected blossom in the wasteland, the tough and tender desert rose.

A detailed account of Coretta Scott King's upbringing in a family of proud, land-owning African Americans with a devotion to the ideals of social equality and the values of education, as well as her later role as her husband's most trusted confidant and advisor.

When Will, a young gay gender-fluid artist is abandoned by the one person he cares most about in the world, he's left desperate and broken, with nowhere to turn. All he has is the phone number of a man who once purchased a few of his paintings and had propositioned him with the opportunity of a lifetime. A year later, Will feels confident, sexy, and desperately in love with Dorian, the owner of New Orleans' underground gay brothel; Desert Rose. The money is good, the sex is better, and every day is a party, until Will realizes things are not what they seem. Every day then becomes a battle between obligation, love, true happiness, and the devastating guilt that Will's newest client, Nikolai, makes him smile more than Dorian ever has.

Jack Halliday struck it rich in the 1860 silver boom in Virginia City! As Annalee and her mother travel to join him in Nevada, their joy turns to ashes. They're unprepared for the savage mountain winter that traps them in a desperate struggle for survival. At this critical moment, lawman Brett Wilder arrives in town. He's looking for the gunslinger who crippled his father—and he suspects Jack. When Annalee and Brett meet as they each search for Jack, they must face what they believe about the sovereignty of God, justice, and mercy. They also must discover whether their growing love for one another will melt like snow into an icy mountain stream or bloom like a rose in the desert.

When gritty pig farmer Desert Rose finds a gold nugget just a-lyin' there in the mud, she decides to buy herself the biggest, fattest hog she can find. But getting that highfalutin hog home in time for the Laredo state fair proves to be more than Rose bargained for. When a cold-hearted coyote, a persnickety snake, a lethargic Texas longhorn, and a whole host of other southern varmints prove to be unhelpful, Rose must pair up with a shrewd armadillo to get every animal over the river and off to Laredo in time.

This text offers reflections on a daunting and controversial ethical question: How should we treat the strangers who enter this country illegally? To understand the experience of those directly confronted by this problem, Rose travelled to the Sonoran desert at the border between the US and Mexico.

Fleeing the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, Corporal Meyer returns home to Pysznica to rejoin his family. Miriam, a young woman traveling with her family, stops in Pysznica to take care of her ill father. Meyer and Miriam meet, and their love for each other blossoms despite the hardships of war. Working together, they try to keep their two Jewish families alive-no small feat during the Nazi occupation. They struggle to survive as they are forced into slave labor, and endure some of the worst treatment and anti-Semitism the world has ever seen. They are compelled to go into hiding. Meyer and Miriam must watch as their large family is threatened, not knowing what will become of everyone. Eventually, Miriam and Meyer are separated. Miriam is forced to adopt a new identity while Meyer is subjected to the abuse of three concentration camps. If only they can survive this war and the fuhrer's plot to destroy their people, they can finally be together. Miriam and Meyer's story of survival, love, and enduring commitment through suffering is a testament to the power of love and the ferocity of war.