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Beautiful Dreamer
by Joan Naper

Chicago in 1900 is bursting with opportunity, and Kitty Coakley is determined to make the most of it. The youngest of seven children born to Irish immigrants, she has little interest in becoming simply a housewife. Inspired by her entrepreneurial Aunt Mabel, who runs a millinery boutique at Marshall Field’s, Kitty aspires to become an independent, modern woman. After her music teacher dashes her hopes of becoming a professional singer, she refuses to give up her dreams of a career. But when she is courted by not one, but two young men, her resolve is tested. Irish-Catholic Brian is familiar and has the approval of her traditional, working-class family. But wealthy, Protestant Henry, who is a young architect in Daniel Burnham’s office, provides an entrée for Kitty into another, more exciting world. Will she sacrifice her ambitions and choose a life with one of these men?

Beautiful Dreamer is a heartwarming coming-of-age story rich with historical details that bring turn-of-the-century Chicago to life.

Beautiful Dreamer was a semi-finalist in the 2008 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest and received the following review from Publishers Weekly:

"A delightful coming-of-age story about a young Irish woman finding her way in Chicago in 1900. . . . Wonderfully descriptive settings firmly place the book in turn-of-the-century Chicago and New Orleans, where Kitty must choose between a comfortable, pre-approved path, or what her heart really desires."

The Author

Joan Naper is a proud fifth-generation Chicagoan who is endlessly fascinated by the history and possibility that can be found in her beloved hometown. After years working as a speechwriter and editor, she works today as the research communications director at a major university. This is her first novel.

Coming in December 2010



Set the Night on Fire
by Libby Fischer Hellmann

Trade Paperback • ISBN 978-0-9840676-5-7

$14.99 ($17.99 CAN)

Hardcover • ISBN 978-0-9840676-6-4

$24.99 ($29.99 CAN)

"A tremendous thriller: sweeping but intimate, elegiac but urgent, subtle but intense. This story really does set the night on fire." 
—Lee Child

Someone is trying to kill Lila Hilliard. During the Christmas holidays she returns from running errands to find her family home in flames, her father and brother trapped inside. Later, she is attacked by a mysterious man on a motorcycle. . . and the threats don’t end there.

As Lila desperately tries to piece together who is after her and why, she uncovers information about her father’s past in Chicago during the volatile days of the late 1960s . . . information he never shared with her, but now threatens to destroy her.

Part thriller, part historical novel, and part love story, Set the Night on Fire paints an unforgettable portrait of Chicago during a turbulent time: the riots at the Democratic Convention . . . the struggle for power between the Black Panthers and SDS . . . and a group of young idealists who tried to change the world.

 The Author

Libby Fischer Hellmann is the award-winning author of the Ellie Foreman and Georgia Davis mystery series, and Nice Girl Does Noir, a two volume short story collection.  She also edited the highly praised crime fiction anthology, Chicago Blues. She has lived in the Chicago area over thirty years. Set the Night on Fire is her first stand-alone novel.

 Praise for the novels of

Libby Fischer Hellmann

“Hellmann has already joined an elite club: Chicago mystery writers who not only inhabit the environment but also give it a unique flavor.”—Chicago Tribune

“A masterful blend of politics, history, and suspense. . .[with] sharp humor and vivid language.”—Publishers Weekly

“Libby Hellmann knows how to reel in a reader, and she does it expertly in Doubleback. One of the tensest opening scenes ever written is just the introduction to a true puzzler of a thriller.”—Tess Gerritsen, NYT bestselling author of Ice Cold: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel