Showing results by author "Jessie Gussman" in All Categories

Single mom Peyton Sinclair came to the town of Sweet Water to raise her son away from the influence of her ex-husband’s mother. She’s happy with her bookstore and bake shop and is not interested in doing anything but making a living and raising her son. Bryce Shaker had been baseball’s highest paid athlete at one point in his career.

When she develops pneumonia, Shasta Bingley can’t believe how the town of Sweet Water comes together to take care of her. Especially Nolt Powers, who not only pays her rent, but sits up with her through the worst of her sickness so she’s not alone. Although she loves the town of Sweet Water, Shasta has to leave, since her job as a painter can’t support her in such a small town. Then an unthinkable accident happens, and Nolt needs help.

Once the vows were said, she had to keep them. After all, they were said to God just as much as to her loser, neglectful husband. And so for 15 years and four children, Carmen Davis stayed true, kept her word, and did her level best to love the man she married. But she never forgot the man who could make her heart race and whose life was as straight and true as it had promised to be in high school.

Late one night Lincoln was delivering a yard decoration when he came upon a wild, unruly teenager throwing stones at the window of his neighbor’s house. He tackled the belligerent child and was about to call the cops when she informed him she was his neighbor’s sister who had been locked out of the house. Oops. Not the best beginning, but it gets worse when he accidentally walks into her house and accuses her of squatting in it.

Madeline Reese has a successful cooking show, a best-selling line of cookbooks and is considered one of the top celebrity chefs in Hollywood. One small problem – she can’t cook. Loyal Hudson doesn’t want to open his world-class kitchen to the cameras Madeline will bring with her, but the celebrity chef could be the bridge between him and a future with his little girl.

Waverley Madris is two months behind on her rent and about to lose her house and her children. Getting stuck with handsome Zane Hudson and his four kids in the Diner bathroom seems like just the type of thing that was just her luck. Except she emerges from that bathroom an engaged woman.

On the day Deacon Hudson was set to be ordained, a bundle shows up at the church with a simple note on it. Deacon Hudson is the father. Take care of her. Deacon knows he’s not the father. The Immaculate Conception was a one time thing. But the baby needs a parent, and he has to decide if he will give up his life dream of being a pastor to take the child, despite the fact that the note is a lie. Can he do it without resenting the child?

Ivory Haines is the daughter of the town’s resident retired prostitute and possibly the town drunk, although her mother wasn’t entirely certain. She resents her position in the town – and especially resents the teasing she’d been subjected to – and has vowed to show everyone that she is just as good as they are. She can hardly believe her luck when Chandler Hudson donates a month of his time to the highest bidder at the charity auction to benefit local victims of the recent tornado damage.

Braxton Emmerson was born and bred in the heartland. He loves his farm and his family, but he was willing to give it all up for the woman who stole his heart. But she didn’t want to give up her career and insisted on keeping their romance a secret. But then her business partner doubled crossed her, and she ended up with a prison sentence for tax evasion. Now she’s out and she’s much wiser.

After her husband walks out, leaving her with three small children, Shelby isn't interested in romance. She just wants her roof to not leak and the furnace to work. Keene Emmerson is ready to settle down, but he's not expecting to find love in a single wide trailer amidst the chaos of kids and construction and a pair of September sky blue eyes.

Originally diagnosed with Lyme disease, Esther MacCartney is frustrated because she’s been bedridden for months and doctors can’t tell her if she’ll ever be well again. The only person who’s visited her regularly is her sister’s on-again, off-again boyfriend, Monroe. He makes her laugh and treats her like he enjoys her company. But her sister has a job offer off the farm, and Esther is afraid Monroe will propose to get her to stay.

Elias Emerson has worked hard and become a successful businessman. Fellow businesswoman Catherine Hutchison has been with him, helping him, all his adult life, but he’s never really paid attention to her. She's just there. Never noticed how much she did for him behind the scenes. How much she lifted him up and made him better. How much she sacrificed to give him the support and encouragement he needed.

I thought it would be a good idea to buy a dog…. I ended up with an ATV I have no idea how to drive. I’m not sure how this happened, especially since the man I purchased it from, Justin Gabriel, introduced himself by running his remote-controlled monster pickup into my high heeled shoe. I’m serious, studious, and a high school English teacher at Good Grief High. Needless to say, Justin Gabriel is not my type.

I’m a city girl and proud of it. Chicago is my hometown and I’m in my element surrounded by people and buildings and busyness. Actually, my business—my vlog—depends on my interactions with people. You can’t go viral talking about your pet turtle. Well, maybe some people can, but that’s not how I became a highly paid influencer. I was happy to use my influence to help my grandmother, Agnes, save her assisted care facility. I thought I was going to hate being out in the wilderness for days on end…bugs and bears and no internet or sushi bars.

People are so serious about life. I feel it was made to be enjoyed. I’m not interested in having a great career or climbing a corporate ladder or being inside much at all, actually. I don’t like to stay with things too long, either. I’ve worked as a short line cook, a firefighter, and a dolphin trainer among other things. So, when the ladies at the Good Grief senior living center offer me a short term job as the photographer for the risqué nature calendar they want to pose for—to cross it off of Miss Agnes’s bucket list—I am all in.

I live in Idaho. (Yes, potatoes. *eye roll* Can we talk about something else?) And I love it here. Small town values galore and it’s right where I want to raise my girls after my jerk ex traded me in for a “younger, newer model” (his words, not mine).

It took me a while—most of my life, in fact—to decide that my hometown of Good Grief, Idaho, is the best place in the world to live. But I have and I love it...except for one thing. My boss. Okay, so the man is good at his job. We just have a tendency to disagree on how much activity the seniors at our assisted-living center want to have.

Willen Hawkins knew exactly what she wanted to do with her unexpected inheritance: use it to fix up the Indigo Inn at Blueberry Beach. After all, it’s been more than 18 years since she graduated from Blueberry Beach High and left town. The life she’s created for herself is far more lonely than the life she’d envisioned for herself as a teen. But if she wants to reinvent herself and start building the life she wants, she has to stop waiting for everything to be perfect and start now.

Tiffany Grant wanted to return to her hometown of Blueberry Beach in style—but a bunch of bad choices mean that she’s crawling back with barely a penny to her name. At least her debts are paid off, even if she had to sell everything she owned to make that happen. She has a lot of regrets and a lot of sins and secrets to make up for. So the first thing she does when she arrives at Blueberry Beach is to stop at the church and volunteer for every program they have. Kane Burton has a secret past of his own. No one expects their pastor to have been a male stripper.

As they agreed on the night of their high school graduation, Leiklyn and her two friends, Tiffany and Willen, meet on the porch of the Manor at Blueberry Beach on April Fool’s day, 18 years after being given their diplomas. Life hadn’t turned out as expected for any of them. A single mother for 15 years, Leiklyn recently lost her job and her unemployment is running out. Could the manor she and her friends bought for one dollar be the change she needs to move forward in her life? Or will it just complicate things when she finds out the explosive secret her daughter is hiding?