Dessie O'Connell was 6 feet 3, thick of bone, and naturally muscular. Unlike almost all of the actors with whom he'd first competed for parts, he hardly needed to work out in order to resemble a Hellenic god.

I’m actually looking forward to staying the night in an old castle.” Courtney glanced up the High Street. “I was told about the beauty of Broadway and I have to say, they were right. It certainly does take your breath away.”

The old farmhouse had idled on the market ever since the previous owners had died in a freak fire. Investigators had suspected arson but never uncovered evidence.

The dinner invitation was totally unexpected since Josiah Gorgas had not heard from his high school and college buddy Austin Ervin in well over a decade.

I like the tennis courts 'cause they're green, red, and white, but the truth is—I hate tennis.

As a rule, the Bishop was more in than out. Consequently the size, the airiness, and the aggressive modernity of the room made quite an impression on him. Deacon Sue realised this from the way he quietly looked around and nodded.

I’d been hiding behind a particularly impressive tomb. It was like a big chest freezer carved out of stone, with a figure lying on top. “Recumbent,” as Kate informed me.

Mimosa Mitchell was an 85-year-old “pillar of the community” and matriarch of one of the most prominent families in Petunia Springs.

When a friend asks Ethan to test out his new navigation app for a journey across the country, Ethan happily obliges. However, as with most new apps, it's not uncommon to run into a few bugs along the way.

“Three years,” I tell her, “Three years since I saw you in the courtroom, lying to save your husband. Perjuring yourself and destroying our case.”

Was this the reason his store had seen such a sudden decline in sales? And if so, what was so special about this new wave of bobbleheads?

My office opens the earliest on the square, before the newsagent, the butcher, the café, or the florist. My clients tend to wake early if they have slept at all.

I asked my mother once when I was old enough to figure things out if I was an accident. She smiled and said no, more of an afterthought.

He wondered if he died there, would he grow into the poplar and live forever towering over the valley? It appealed to him, but dying could wait. At sixteen, life offered too much.

“This is it,” he said. “This is the big one. After years of carrying crap, we’ve finally got us a job that’s going to change our bank accounts and bloat our pensions.