Eleven-year-old Allister McRuer’s fears materialize when he and his family arrive at their Manitoba pioneer homestead in 1892. What could make it worse? Being called Allis.During the trip from Lachute, Quebec to Cherry Creek, Manitoba, Allister shares a train boxcar with three of his brothers and all of their family’s livestock. The closer he gets to the homestead his father and oldest brother, John, started three years ago, the worse Allister’s misery gets as older brother, Will, torments Allister by calling him “Allis,” a name he hates because it sounds like “Alice.”Allister’s first hour in Cherry Creek does little to ease his concerns. While their brothers unload the McRuers’ two boxcars, Allister and his twin brother, Jim, explore the town. Allister is discouraged at the small size of the local school, wondering how he will ever finish grade eight. As they continue walking, Allister and Jim witness a terrible accident. Although they’re able to help a horse and an injured driver, Allister’s anxiety over his family’s move to the prairies takes a new turn when he’s told that the only doctor

Twelve-year-old Allister McRuer can’t wait to attend the brand new, one-room schoolhouse that he, his father, and brothers helped to build on a corner of his family’s pioneer homestead in southwestern Manitoba. There was no school within walking distance when Allister and his family first arrived in May of 1892. More than a year has passed, and Allister worries that he has forgotten everything he learned at his school in eastern Canada. Will he and his twin brother, Jim, ever be able to catch up? Allister’s excitement quickly turns to frustration. His new teacher doesn’t seem to know how to handle sixteen children in Grades 1 through 8. What chaos! And his father continually pulls Allister and Jim out of school to help with the harvest or to build on their older brothers’ homestead claims. How are he and Jim going to pass any grade?

Satisfied with a Grade 8 education? Not fourteen-year-old Allister McRuer. The first step to realizing his dreams requires high school, but will his father ever allow him to leave the farm and live in town to attend? Allister’s one thread of hope for more education involves waiting for their one-room school to get a teacher with a high school diploma, and then persuading that teacher to help him study Grade 9. However, when fire spreads from Turtle Mountain towards the McRuers’ farm and the school, Allister must work quickly to prevent this hope from disappearing into ashes. In the midst of his fight for an education, Allister meets Sam Pollack in the fall of 1896, an itinerant worker from Ontario who comes to the farm. He asks Allister a pointed question: “What do you want to do with your life?” Will answering truthfully change anything? And if he ever gets his wish to attend high school in Cherry Creek, what name should he ask his classmates and teachers to call him by? Certainly not Allister!

One hundred years in the future, Government Observers roam the classrooms of average learners, looking for the rare gifted learners still left in the general population. One gifted child, who has been carefully coached by his mother to appear average, is unaware that his abilities have been documented by an Observer for years, until he is tricked into showing his mathematical strengths. He is devastated to receive a letter requiring him to test at The School for Gifted Potentials, but he cleverly sabotages the tests and is prepared to leave, only to discover that his mother has abandoned him at the school she has raised him to fear. During his one week orientation, as he undertakes an enlightening journey of self-discovery, he uncovers a secret about his mother's past that leads him to question everything that he once believed.

A dramatic, emotional medieval romance Sworn to protect her But she’s threatening his guarded heart… Retrieving Lady Allis from a convent is no easy task, as mercenary knight Sir Leon soon discovers… Brave and beautiful, Allis awakens emotions Leon thought he’d long buried after losing his family. Yet upon their return to her castle, the social gulf between them widens when Allis’s father demands she marry a nobleman. Leon has always believed love is an illusion, but will he be able to watch his defiant lady marry another? From Harlequin Historical: Your romantic escape to the past. Convent Brides Book 1: A Knight for the Defiant Lady Book 2: A Knight for the Runaway Nun

Step back in time and experience the grandeur and romance of a previous era as Harlequin® Historical brings you three new full-length titles in one collection! This boxset includes: THE HOUSEKEEPER’S FORBIDDEN EARL by Laura Martin (Regency) Kate’s finally found peace working in a grand house, until her new employer, Lord Henderson, returns. Soon, it’s not just the allure of the home that Kate’s falling for…but its owner, too! THE VISCOUNT’S DARING MISS by Lotte R. James (1830s) When groom Roberta “Bobby” Kinsley comes face-to-face with her horse racing opponent—infuriatingly charismatic Viscount Hayes—it’s clear that it won’t just be the competition that has her heart racing! A KNIGHT FOR THE DEFIANT LADY Convent Brides by Carol Townend (Medieval) Attraction sparks when Sir Leon retrieves brave, beautiful Lady Allis from a convent and they journey back to her castle. Only for Allis’s father to demand she marry a nobleman!