Nora

Even in Nora Roberts' world, truth can be stranger than fiction. In the best-selling author's books, the smart, sexy heroines solve crimes, rescue loved ones and always get the guy. And in mountainous Western Maryland, Roberts' new boutique hotel has just as improbable - and rose-colored - a back story. As a longtime resident of nearby Keedysville, Roberts watched the old inn on Boonsboro's main street, which dated from the 1790s, slowly decline. In 2007, the romance novelist and her photographer husband, Bruce Wilder, who has run the Turn the Page Bookstore Cafe across the street for more than a decade, decided to fix up the old three-story inn, turning it into a romantic, B&B-style boutique hotel.

GRANTHAM On January 12, 2009 NORA BELLE TAYLOR GRANTHAM beloved mother of Catherine Burton. On Sunday friends may call at Hamilton Funeral Chapel, 423 S. James Street, Goldsboro, NC 27530 from 6-8 p.m. On Monday, the family will receive friends at Best Grove Missionary Baptist Church from 10-11 a.m. with services to follow. Inquiries to 919-734-0621.

On Monday, November 17, 2008 Nora Frye Private memorial service at a later date. Arrangements made by Burrier Queen Funeral Home and Crematory P.A. www.burrier-queen.com

On October 15, 2008, JULIUS A. MESSINA; beloved husband of the late Nora Messina (nee Cary); devoted father of Nora Talbott and her late husband Thomas, Nancy Shaffer and her husband Kent; dear brother of Marie Messina; loving grandfather of Meredith Millett and Mehan McGrath; great-grandfather of Julianna Millett and Bridgett Millett. A graveside service will be held at Dulaney Valley Memorial Gardens, Tuesday at 10 A.M. In lieu of flowers memorial donations in his name may be made to Stella Maris Hospice, 2300 Dulaney Valley Road, Timonium, MD 21093.

A play about a woman who declares her independence from her marriage and her family was something audiences in 1879 weren't ready for. Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House shocked and offended people wherever it was performed. The Norwegian dramatist maintained that his script wasn't about a woman; it was about anyone who had to live according to rules created by others. But the drama tied in perfectly with the stirrings about women's rights that were being felt in Europe and the United States toward the end of the 19th century.

BOONSBORO -- The characters are stirringly romantic, by turns witty and tempestuous, flirtatious and elusive. The setting is Main Street, in a small town tucked in the side of a mountain and shrouded in history. And the plot? Stay tuned because it continues to unfurl in the hands of author Nora Roberts. The prolific romance writer - someone calculated that she sells 21 books every minute - is hard at work spinning her next amorous tale. This time, though, the end result will be not words but rooms, not pages but high-thread-count sheets, not a book but a bed-and-breakfast that promises to draw even more of her fans to a town that quickly is turning into Noraboro, Md., 21713.

On November 25, 2007, NORA M. Friends may call at the CHATMAN-HARRIS FUNERAL HOME, 5240 Reisterstown Road, Thursday 5 to 8 P.M. and Friday 10 to 3 P.M. After 4 P.M. on Friday Mrs. Anderson will rest at Cornerstone Church of Christ, 4239 Park Heights Avenue where the family will receive friends at 6:30 P.M. Funeral service will begin at 7 P.M. Interment Louden Park Cemetery Saturday at 10 A.M.

We'll always have Paris," Mister Rick told Ilsa in Casablanca. The line cemented Americans' continuing affair with the City of Light as the perfect setting for romance and intrigue. And this delightfully dangerous liaison has never gone out of fashion, no matter how much our public figures deride France as a soft-sister democracy. In the appealingly amorous dramedy Broken English, opening today at the Charles, a heroine with the classic movie name Nora Wilder undertakes what has become the quintessential quest for a metropolis also known as the City of Love.

Writer-director Zoe Cassavetes, the daughter of Gena Rowlands and the late actor-director John Cassavetes, has made a distinctive romantic comedy-drama called Broken English. If it lasts a month at the Charles, fans of the theater's film noir series should plan to make it a double-bill with In a Lonely Place (playing Aug. 18, 20 and 23), the 1950 romantic mystery that Cassavetes' heroine, Nora (Parker Posey), sees with a date at a Manhattan revival house. In that cult classic, Bogey plays a tormented, possibly homicidal screenwriter who tells the woman who's just fallen in love with him, "A good love scene should be about something else besides love.

On March 18, 2007, NORA BAXTER; devoted mother of Sandra Baxter; cherished sister of Susie Smith and Crawford Dotson, Jr.; adored aunt of Walter Parker; beloved great aunt of Patricia Sharp, Pamela Bass, and Ronald Parker. Friends may call at the family owned MARCH FUNERAL HOME WEST, INC. 4300 Wabash Avenue on Thursday after 8:30 A.M., where the family will receive friends from 5 to 7 P.M. The family will receive friends on Friday at Southern Baptist Church 1701 N. Chester Street at 11 A.M., followed by funeral services at 11:30 A.M.