White Fence

Sketch artist Tino Ciccotelli is passionately dedicated to helping victims of violent crime. For years he's translated their descriptions of attackers into "WANTED" posters. While listening to the victims' pain is emotionally draining, Tino accepts this as part of the job--until he discovers that he and his newest client have a personal connection. He is devastated to see Dorothy's injuries and determined to help the police catch her attacker, but he must also deal with the return of her niece, his first love who left him when their lives were just beginning.

When her black sheep brother disappears, Amanda Janvier eagerly takes in her sixteen year-old niece Tally. The girl is practically an orphan: motherless, and living with a father who raises Tally wherever he lands– in a Buick, a pizza joint, a horse farm–and regularly takes off on wild schemes. Amanda envisions that she, her husband Neil, and their two teenagers can offer the girl stability and a shot at a “normal” life, even though their own storybook lives are about to crumble.

Katie discovers that the valley behind her grandmother’s garden is more mysterious than it seems. After tumbling into 10th-century England and encountering Saint Edith of Wilton along with her wild animal menagerie, she is helped home, wondering whether her adventure was truly real. But after Katie, her cousins, and a neighborhood friend are drawn back in time once again, she realizes her grandmother’s garden gate is a portal into faraway worlds, where patron saints are real people making real-life decisions.

The notion that some might have it better than others, for no good reason, offends our sensibilities. Yet, until we talk about privilege, we’ll never fully understand it or find our way forward. Amy Julia Becker welcomes us into her life, from the charm of her privileged southern childhood to her adult experience in the Northeast, and the denials she has faced as the mother of a child with special needs. She tells us how a life behind a white picket fence can restrict even as it protects and how it can prevent us from loving our neighbors well.

My four-decade journey, authentic and raw, is written to help chip away the stigma associated with mental illness in order to create the healthy relationships we all crave and need as humans.

Ben Rehder is best known for his hilarious Blanco County mystery series featuring Texas game warden John Marlin. But Rehder has written numerous magazine articles over the years, and this collection presents some of his favorites, with a focus on game warden anecdotes and Texas wildlife. Also includes a bonus excerpt from Rehder's Edgar Award-nominated first novel, Buck Fever. Don't miss it!

White Picket Fences is a heartfelt family drama fueled by an honest story of motherhood, written for those of us caught up in our own self-searching journeys. The one thing Julie Cahill knows, because of her transitory upbringing as a military brat is that she never had a hometown. So she has made sure her kids would grow up in one forever home, in a forever neighborhood, with lots of forever friends. Yet her dream of a permanent hometown has her feeling fenced in.

Nothing is simple about being a new mom alone in a new house, especially when your baby is collicky. Natalie Fanning loves her son unconditionally, but being a mother was not all she wanted to be. Enter Paul, the neighbor. Paul provides the lifeline she needs in what feels like the most desperate of times. When Paul is helping with Oliver, calmed by his reassuring, steady presence, Nat feels like she can finally rest. But Paul wants something in return.

Have you ever felt burdened by tradition? Or second-guessed your uniqueness because of society? Men and women around the world spend their lives conforming to norms. They forget the value of their time, putting their shoulders on the wheel for the role they are trying to fulfil. Women are at the short end of the bargain in most instances, but men don’t always have it easy. When it comes to marriage or sex, there are expectations on both sides. We build our dream home on the shaky ground of tradition and wonder why there are so many tremors.

This story came to me in the form of a letter and email, and I am publishing it with the author's permission, I hope, word for word, with nothing changed or left out except the author's name and the city where he lives....