Bøger af Thomas Conrad

When America shuts down in 2020 to deal with the oncoming pandemic, twenty-year-old college student Mike Wilson travels to Michigan to give support to the hospitalized father who abandoned him as a child. The job he takes pruning an orchard on a struggling farm is soon complicated by the resident collie's discovery of a skeletal human foot buried among the trees. Mike falls in love with a beautiful jogger, and together they face the creepiness of the farm while everyone is pursued by the infectious disease. The contents of Uncle Tom's Cabinet represent the culmination of a dying airline pilot's life and affect the future of his nephew, Dan. Tom, the uncle who ruins Thanksgiving dinners with obnoxious behavior, resents his confinement in the Better Days Ahead nursing home. He solicits help from his gangster neighbor in an attempt to dissolve Dan's lousy marriage, and crime and subterfuge energize his final days. An old missionary nun is known to leave the Nazareth Home for the Sisters of St. Joseph to wander the streets of the city's Eastside on her painfully swollen elephantine legs. Locally known as the Elephant Lady, she is found dead by the side of the road by a paperboy. A mystery unfolds when the parish priest she knew as an anthropology student in a Costa Rican village gets a clue from the boy that she may have been murdered. Contents from the old woman's safe-deposit box unleashes a primal challenge to the priest's faith. Three months after college graduation in 1968, Ben gets a call from the mother of an old friend and is asked to write the obituary for her son who has been murdered. Ben has been drafted and is days away from induction, but as a part-time copy editor for the Gazette, he agrees to the task. A vivacious young woman gets him through the yellow tape around the crime scene, and he is soon involved in the story. He falls in love with the girl, and his last few days of freedom become the most exciting of his life.

The birth of Siamese twin girls in the town of Spanish Fork, Utah, in 1849 causes quite a stir. Residents flock to the Chatham Ranch to see the babies and offer their condolences for the loss of the mother who did not survive the birth. When the attempted sale of the twins by their father to a passing circus fails, they are kidnapped by circus owner Colonel Phantastic. Young Deputy John Walker is sent to Salt Lake City to retrieve them and is surprised when the twins' sister Zelda joins him on the train. In a whirlwind romance, they are married and together confront the babies' derelict father and the Colonel in their separate pursuits of the infant girls.The story of Prudence and Chastity covers twenty years and takes them to Alamo, Montana, where they hope to finance their unspoken goal of separation as showgirls and prostitutes. There they are rescued by a fifteen-year-old boy from the Blazing Star when it burns. Sam Shines travels with them to St. Louis, where he is wanted for murder, and on to Chicago for an appointment with a renowned doctor. Their arrival coincides with the Great Chicago Fire, as conflagration continues to define their lives.The twins are at once beautiful, charming, and fascinating to anyone who sees them. Their influence on the lives of those they hold close is haunting, sometimes tragic, and always unforgettable.

After a thirty year absence, Bobby Gallagher returns to his hometown to say goodbye to his dying mother. Back in Kalamazoo, he faces haunting memories of a tragedy involving his high school sweetheart, and her brutal father. Having been unjustly accused of being responsible for that tragedy, Bobby is presented with an ultimatum by a corrupt judge-- Vietnam or jail. Back home, he finds a letter from his deceased father that offers clues to what deputy sheriff Ted Dorn discovered about Bobby's alleged crimes. Tough questions from his mother, and guidance from a Catholic nun help him piece together the circumstances that led to his banishment. Bobby renews a difficult relationship with his lawyer sister, and rekindles the fire of his pubescent first love Rita, the girl next door. He reunites with Jack Dooley, the leader of the RECON team he served with, and watches the dismantling of the smuggling operation that's been run with mob-like efficiency since it began in Vietnam. Bobby relives in vivid detail his military experience, and the dangerous and often out of control life of an infantry soldier in 1969. The memories of his youth and home surround him, and with the help of these characters he orchestrates a long overdue justice, and changes their lives in the process.