

UNITED STATES AUTHOR · FICTION · LARGE TYPE
Karen Robards
Also known as: KAREN ROBARDS, Luo ba de si (Robards, Karen)
Karen Robards was born on 24 August 1954 in Louisville, Kentucky, USA. She has been writing since she was a teenager. Karen sold her first short story, when was very young, and was published in the December 1973 Reader's Digest, but she cannot sold her first romance novel until 1981, when she was 24. After it, she dropped out of law school to pursue her writing career. Today, a regular on the New York Times, USA Today and Publishers Weekly bestseller lists, among others, she is the winner of six Affaire de Coeur Silver Pen Awards for favorite romance author, as well as numerous other awards. She writes historical and contemporary romances. Karen lives in native Louisville with her husband, Doug, and their three sons Peter (b. 1983), Christopher "Chris" (b. 1989), and Jack (b. 1994). She says: "I read, I write, and I chauffeur children," she says with a laugh. "That's my life."
He was going to be trouble.
— from Morning Song
Most acclaimed

Morning Song
THE SWEET MUSIC OF RESTLESS HEARTS Their destinies intertwined on a sprawling plantation in the heat of a blistering Southern summer - a young Mississippi wildflower in the early bloom of womanhood and a brazen riverboat gambler living the dangerous secret life of another man. An untouched beauty and an unscrupulous rogue, they were damned by forbidden desires in a rigid world of lace and propriety - as two reckless hearts courted shame, scandal, and ruin in desperate pursuit of a breathless, impossible love... An innocent Mississippi wildflower in the early bloom of womanhood, headstrong Jessie Lindsay will do anything to thwart the charming, enigmatic fortune hunter who has come to wed her widowed stepmother. But there is far more to Stuart Edwards than Jessie first imagines. And in the heat of a blistering Southern summer, the handsome riverboat gambler will awaken feelings she has never known—and share with her his dangerous secrets—as reckless, undeniable desire propels them both toward scandal, possible ruin...and impossible love.

One Summer
Let our favourite writer of narrative non-fiction take you back to a summer when America came of age and changed the world for ever. In summer 1927, America had a booming stock market, a president who worked just four hours a day (and slept much of the rest), a devastating flood of the Mississippi, a sensational murder trial, and an unknown aviator named Charles Lindbergh who became the most famous man on earth. It was the summer that saw the birth of talking pictures, the invention of television, the peak of Al Capone’s reign of terror, the horrifying bombing of a school in Michigan, the thrillingly improbable return to greatness of over-the-hill baseball player Babe Ruth, and an almost impossible amount more. In this hugely entertaining book, Bill Bryson spins a tale of brawling adventure, reckless optimism and delirious energy. With the trademark brio, wit and authority that make him Britain’s favourite writer of narrative non-fiction, he brings to life a forgotten summer when America came of age, took centre stage, and changed the world.

Hunted
Caroline Wallace is one of New Orleans PD's top hostage negotiators, and she's never failed to get every hostage out alive. But this time, it's different. This time, the hostages include her boss, the chief of police, and the mayor. And this time, she's trying to negotiate with Reed Ware, a former co-worker who left the force disgraced, under investigation by Internal Affairs, and worst of all, considered to be volatile and extremely dangerous. When the chief of police and the mayor of New Orleans are taken hostage by disgraced former co-worker Reed Ware, top hostage negotiator Caroline Wallace allows herself to be taken captive by the handsome Reed only to learn that he is being targeted for his discovery of high-level government corruption. "Twas the night before Christmas, and dozens of rich, influential hostages are trapped inside a sprawling lakefront mansion in New Orleans. The perp? Detective Reed Ware, model cop turned outlaw. After receiving a panicked call from Hollis "Holly" Bayard, a teenage street tough with a penchant for amateur sleuthing who stumbles upon the scene of a drug-deal-turned- murder, Ware finds his and his friend's lives in dire danger. The crime Holly witnessed could be the biggest police cover-up this side of New Orleans -- and no one's talking. Driven to desperate measures to uncover the truth, Ware stages a coup at a Christmas party for the New Orleans elite, including the mayor, the council chairman, the sheriff, and the superintendent of police, who just happens to be hostage negotiator Caroline Wallace's estranged father. Cool, calm, controlled. That's Caroline's reputation. But when she's brought in to talk Ware off the proverbial ledge, she realizes no amount of false promises is going to placate this man, who looks even hotter than he did years ago when seventeen-year-old Caroline tried to seduce him. It was his duty to protect her family then. Now it's her turn. if she can think fast enough over the pounding of her heart. When Caroline becomes wrapped up in the drama, it's clear the sizzling tension she shared with Ware never let up. And the harder she tries to defuse the situation, the more she begins to wonder whose side she's really on"--