Just about everyone from my country, República Dominicana, dreams of moving to New York City, except for me. On the flight to New York, my first time on a plane, my first time away from Mami, I was finally free to cry. But nothing came out. I watched as the green mountains of my beloved island slipped away far below.Fifteen-year-old Nina Perez is faced with a future she never expected. She must leave her Garden of Eden, her lush island home in Samana, Dominican Republic, when she's sent by her mother to live with her brother, Darrio, in New York, to seek out a better life. As Nina searches for some glimpse of familiarity amid the urban and jarring world of Washington Heights, she learns to uncover her own strength and independence. She finds a way to grow, just like the orchids that blossom on her fire escape. And as she is confronted by ugly secrets about her brother's business, she comes to understand the realities of life in this new place. But then she meets him—that tall, green-eyed boy—one that she can't erase from her thoughts, who just might help her learn to see beauty in spite of tragedy.From the acclaimed author of the color of my words comes a powerful story of a girl who must make her way in a new world and find her place within it.

As the sun sets on the time of the dinosaurs, a new world is left in its wake. . . .DuskHe alone can fly and see in the dark, in a colony where being different means being shunned—or worse. As the leader's son, he is protected, but does his future lie among his kinCarnassialHe has the true instincts of a predator, and he is determined that his kind will not only survive but will dominate the world of beasts. From the author of the internationally acclaimed Silverwing trilogy comes an extraordinary adventure set 65 million years ago. Kenneth Oppel, winner of a Michael L. Printz Honor for Airborn, has crafted a breathtaking animal tale that reaches out to the human in all of us.

Let’s face it, how we behave is a choice, and as you move into adult life, the choices get more complicated. You are out in the world, meeting all kinds of people and going different places on your own. Questions of etiquette seem to pop up everywhere you go:What’s the latest on cell phone use and netiquette?How can you make a good impression at college and job interviewsWhat fork do you use?How do you attach a boutonniere without sticking your prom dateAnd what is a boutonniere, anyway?Not to worry, help is at hand! Teen Manners: From Malls to Meals to Messaging and Beyond is a useful guide that answers questions that come up in real life from the most trusted name in etiquette: Emily Post.

America's Women tells the story of more than four centuries of history. It features a stunning array of personalities, from the women peering worriedly over the side of the Mayflower to feminists having a grand old time protesting beauty pageants and bridal fairs. Courageous, silly, funny, and heartbreaking, these women shaped the nation and our vision of what it means to be female in America.By culling the most fascinating characters -- the average as well as the celebrated -- Gail Collins, the editorial page editor at the New York Times, charts a journey that shows how women lived, what they cared about, and how they felt about marriage, sex, and work. She begins with the lost colony of Roanoke and the early southern "tobacco brides" who came looking for a husband and sometimes -- thanks to the stupendously high mortality rate -- wound up marrying their way through three or four. Spanning wars, the pioneering days, the fight for suffrage, the Depression, the era of Rosie the Riveter, the civil rights movement, and the feminist rebellion of the 1970s, America's Women describes the way women's lives were altered by dress fashions, medical advances, rules of hygiene, social theories about sex and courtship, and the ever-changing attitudes toward education, work, and politics. While keeping her eye on the big picture, Collins still notes that corsets and uncomfortable shoes mattered a lot, too."The history of American women is about the fight for freedom," Collins writes in her introduction, "but it's less a war against oppressive men than a struggle to straighten out the perpetually mixed message about women's roles that was accepted by almost everybody of both genders."Told chronologically through the compelling stories of individual lives that, linked together, provide a complete picture of the American woman's experience, America's Women is both a great read and a landmark work of history.

The Red Dragon & The West Wind is the perfect introduction to this ancient game of strategy and subterfuge, covering all aspects of the two most common varieties, American and Chinese, along with an overview of other global approaches. The book begins with the history and origin and moves on to the rules of play and ways to win and avoid essential errors as well as the etiquette to follow. With everything from clear instructions on dealing, building, and distributing tiles to a look at the history and future of the game, this is the essential book for anyone who wants to have fun–and win–while playing mah–jongg.

All the women of the Bible offers a rich biographical perspective on evey female figure in *ure -- including the famous, the little-known, and even the unnamed. In more that 300 engaging and insightful portraits, Edith Deen brings alive the saints and sorceresses, queens and servants, mothers and daughters, wives and widows whose profound influence is felt through-out the Bible. "You can almost trace light and darkness in the Bible by the women themselves,"she writes. "Hannah, praying mother of Samuel, gave birth to a son who became the first great Hebrew prophet. And, of course, there was the mother of Jesus. On the other hand, Jezebel and Herodias were vile influences, the first tearing apart the northern kingdom of Israel, the second causing John the Baptist to be beheaded."Combining thorough detail with a lively and dramatic narrative, All of the Women of the Bible portrays the real women behind the Biblical stories and shows how, in their human struggles and triumphs, they are very much like the women of today. With each major biography identified by Bible chapter and verse and prefaced by a key passage of *ure, this is an ideal resources for teachers, Bible students, preachers, and writers, as well as anyone who wants to learn what it was really like to be a woman in Biblical times.

One On One With SatanA chilling and highly convincing account of possession and exorcism in modern America, hailed by NBC Radio as one of the most stirring books on the contemporary scene.

The epitome of grace, independence, and wit, Lauren Bacall continues to project an audacious spirit and pursue on-screen excellence. The product of an extraordinary mother and a loving extended family, she produced, with Humphrey Bogart, some of the most electric and memorable scenes in movie history. After tragically losing Bogart, she returned to New York and a brilliant career in the theatre. A two-time Tony winner, she married and later divorced her second love, Jason Robards, and never lost sight of the strength that made her a star.Now, thirty years after the publication of her original National Book Award winning memoir, Bacall has added new material to her inspiring history. In her own frank and beautiful words, one of our most enduring actresses reveals the remarkable true story of a lifetime so rich with incident and achievement that Hollywood itself would be unable to adequately reproduce it.

One month in 1865 witnessed the frenzied fall of Richmond, a daring last-ditch Southern plan for guerrilla warfare, Lee's harrowing retreat, and then, Appomattox. It saw Lincoln's assassination just five days later and a near-successful plot to decapitate the Union government, followed by chaos and coup fears in the North, collapsed negotiations and continued bloodshed in the South, and finally, the start of national reconciliation.In the end, April 1865 emerged as not just the tale of the war's denouement, but the story of the making of our nation.Jay Winik offers a brilliant new look at the Civil War's final days that will forever change the way we see the war's end and the nation's new beginning. Uniquely set within the larger sweep of history and filled with rich profiles of outsize figures, fresh iconoclastic scholarship, and a gripping narrative, this is a masterful account of the thirty most pivotal days in the life of the United States.

At last, the definitive account of the Redskins’ championship decade Based on more than ninety original interviews, here is the rollicking chronicle of the famed Washington Redskins teams of the Joe Gibbs years—one of the most remarkable and unique runs in NFL history. From 1981 to 1992, Gibbs coached the franchise to three Super Bowl victories, making the team the toast of the nation’s capital, from the political elite to the inner city, and helping to define one of the sport’s legendary eras. Veteran sportswriter Adam Lazarus masterfully charts the Redskins’ rise from mediocrity (the franchise had never won a Super Bowl and Gibbs’s first year as head coach started with a five-game losing streak that almost cost him his job) to its stretch of four championship games in ten years. What makes their sustained success all the more remarkable, in retrospect, is that unlike the storied championship wins of Joe Montana’s 49ers and Tom Brady’s Patriots, the Redskins’ Super Bowl victories each featured a different starting quarterback: Joe Theismann in 1983, the franchise’s surprising first championship run; Doug Williams in 1988, a win full of meaning for a majority African American city during a tumultuous era; and Mark Rypien in 1992, capping one of the greatest seasons of all time, one that stands as Gibbs’s masterpiece. Hail to the Redskins features an epic roster of saints and sinners: hard-drinking fullback John Riggins; the dominant, blue-collar offensive linemen known as “the Hogs,” who became a cultural phenomenon; quarterbacks Williams, the first African American QB to win a Super Bowl, and Theisman, a model-handsome pitchman whose leg was brutally broken by Lawrence Taylor on Monday Night Football; gregarious defensive end Dexter Manley, who would be banned from the league for cocaine abuse; and others including the legendary speedster Darrell Green, record-breaking receiver Art Monk, rags-to-riches QB Rypien, expert general managers and talent evaluators Bobby Beathard and Charley Casserly, aristocratic owner Jack Kent Cooke, and, of course, Gibbs himself, a devout Christian who was also a ruthless competitor and one of the sport’s most adaptable and creative coaching minds. A must-read for any fan, Hail to the Redskins builds on Lazarus’s interviews with key inside sources to vividly re-create the plays, the players, the fans, and the opponents that shaped this unforgettable football dynasty.

Fans of Three Dark Crowns and Leigh Bardugo will devour the heart-stopping finale to the #1 New York Times bestselling Burning Glass trilogy, as teen empath Sonya fights to regain her powers amidst a vengeful civil war.Civil war is on the horizon, and Sonya is helpless to stop it. With her empathic powers gone, she can no longer protect her beloved Anton from his vindictive brother Valko, who will stop at nothing to get his revenge and reclaim his throne. Even if that means using an Auraseer to hunt—and kill—both Sonya and Anton.Then Sonya hears about an empath in a far-off kingdom who may be able to heal her—but without her powers, finding the legendary Auraseer will be dangerous. And if she doesn’t succeed, the peace Sonya sacrificed so much to achieve will be shattered forever.

A lively anecdotal history of Greenwich Village, the prodigiously influential and infamous New York City neighborhood, from the 1600s to the present The most famous neighborhood in the world, Greenwich Village has been home to outcasts of diverse persuasions from "half-free" Africans to working-class immigrants, from artists to politicians for almost four hundred years. In his magisterial new book, cultural commentator John Strausbaugh weaves an absorbing narrative history of the Village, a tapestry that unrolls from its origins as a rural frontier of New Amsterdam in the 1600s through its long reign as the Left Bank of America in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, from its seat as the epicenter of the gay rights movement to its current status as an affluent bedroom community and tourist magnet. Strausbaugh "a particularly gifted chronicler of New Yorkiana" (Atlantic Monthly ) traces the Village's role as a culture engine, a bastion of tolerance, freedom, creativity, and activism that has spurred cultural change on a national, and sometimes even international, scale. He brings to life the long line of famous nonconformists who have collided there, collaborating, fusing and feuding, developing the ideas and creating the art that forever altered societal norms. In these pages, geniuses are made and destroyed, careers are launched, and revolutions are born. Poe, Whitman, Cather, Baldwin, Kerouac, Mailer, Ginsberg, O'Neill, Pollock, La Guardia, Koch, Hendrix, and Dylan all come together across the ages, at a cultural crossroads the likes of which we may never see again. From Dutch farmers and Washington Square patricians to slaves and bohemians, from Prohibition-era speakeasies to Stonewall, from Abstract Expressionism to AIDS, and from the Triangle Shirtwaist fire to today's upscale condos and four-star restaurants, the connecting narratives of The Village tell the fresh and unforgettable story of America itself.

The stunning conclusion of Tera Lynn Childs's Greek mythology–based Sweet Venom trilogy is perfect for teen fans of Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series.The girls cannot hesitate as they seek the location of the lost door between the realms, even as monsters and the gods of Olympus descend on San Francisco in battle-ready droves.Greer must use her second sight to step up and prevent anything from stopping her sisters' mission, even though a god is playing with her mind. Grace wants to trust her adopted brother, Thane; but will his secret put the girls in even more dangerAnd Gretchen has trained her sisters to stop the monsters, but her role as a huntress comes with more responsibility than she ever imagined.What will the girls' immortal legacy beThree teenage descendants of Medusa must unite to restore balance to the world in this action-packed series with plenty of romance.

The golden skies, the translucent twilight, the white nights, all hold the promise of youth, of love, of eternal renewal. The war has not yet touched this city of fallen grandeur, or the lives of two sisters, Tatiana and Dasha Metanova, who share a single room in a cramped apartment with their brother and parents. Their world is turned upside down when Hitler's armies attack Russia and begin their unstoppable blitz to Leningrad.Yet there is light in the darkness. Tatiana meets Alexander, a brave young officer in the Red Army. Strong and self-confident, yet guarding a mysterious and troubled past, he is drawn to Tatiana and she to him. Starvation, desperation, and fear soon grip their city during the terrible winter of the merciless German siege. Tatiana and Alexander's impossible love threatens to tear the Metanova family apart and expose the dangerous secret Alexander so carefully protects a secret as devastating as the war itself as the lovers are swept up in the brutal tides that will change the world and their lives forever.

For fans of rich and complex historical novels like Girl with a Pearl Earring or Code Name Verity, Laura Malone Elliott delivers the stunning tale of real-life Renaissance woman Ginevra de' Benci, the inspiration for one of Leonardo da Vinci's earliest masterpieces.?The young and beautiful daughter of a wealthy family, Ginevra longs to share her poetry and participate in the artistic ferment of Renaissance Florence but is trapped in an arranged marriage in a society dictated by men. The arrival of the charismatic Venetian ambassador, Bernardo Bembo, introduces Ginevra to a dazzling circle of patrons, artists, and philosophers. Bembo chooses Ginevra as his Platonic muse and commissions a portrait of her by a young Leonardo da Vinci. Posing for the brilliant painter inspires an intimate connection between them, one Ginevra only begins to understand. In a rich and vivid world of exquisite art with a dangerous underbelly of deadly political feuds, Ginevra faces many challenges to discover her voice and artistic companionship—and to find love.

A girl thought to be a boy steals her sister's skirt, while a boy thought to be a girl refuses to wear a cornflower blue dress. One boy's love of a soldier leads to the death of a stranger. The present takes a bittersweet journey into the past when a man revisits the summer school where he had "an accidental romance." And a forgotten mother writes a poignant letter to the teenage daughter she hasn't seen for fourteen years.Poised between the past and the future are the stories of now. In nontraditional narratives, short stories, and brief graphics, tales of anticipation and regret, eagerness and confusion present distinctively modern views of love, sexuality, and gender identification. Together, they reflect the vibrant possibilities available for young people learning to love others—and themselves—in today's multifaceted and quickly changing world.

Betting on the Muse is a combination of hilarious poetry and stories. Charles Bukowski writes about the real life of a working man and all that comes with it.

In the winter of 1951, a storyteller, the last practitioner of an honored, centuries-old tradition, arrives at the home of nine-year-old Ronan O'Mara in the Irish countryside. For three wonderful evenings, the old gentleman enthralls his assembled local audience with narratives of foolish kings, fabled saints, and Ireland's enduring accomplishments before moving on. But these nights change young Ronan forever, setting him on a years-long pursuit of the elusive, itinerant storyteller and the glorious tales that are no less than the saga of his tenacious and extraordinary isle.

For goth-girl Raven, dating her dream boyfriend is complicated, especially because Alexander's secret means that they can see each other only at night.And now the pair must be extra wary in the dark with Alexander's archrival, Jagger, appearing around town. As if Jagger isn't enough cause for worry, Luna, his strikingly pale sister, has also surfaced and seems to have her sights set on Raven's longtime nemesis, Trevor. Together, Raven and Alexander must begin a terrifying search for Jagger and Luna's hideout to drive them away -- that is, if it's not already too late to save Dullsville from becoming Vampireville.In the latest installment of her popular Vampire Kisses books, Ellen Schreiber continues the startling story of two teen outsiders -- she from the mortal world and he from the Underworld -- who share a thrilling, extraordinary romance.

Are you ready for the Badass Body of your dreams?Christmas Abbott is living proof that fitness is sexy, and a badass body is a birthright for one and all. A CrossFit star, professional athlete, former NASCAR pit crew member, Olympic weightlifter, and former unhealthy "skinny fat" woman herself, Christmas knows what real women need in order to get the butts and bodies of their dreams. In The Badass Body Diet, Christmas provides a quick and simple workout plan that tones everything—from booty to total body—and teaches you how to spot-reduce excess fat with targeted meal plans and recipes.Your glutes are the largest and most powerful muscle group in your body, not to mention one of the most beautiful. But they often go dormant, flat, and flabby due to poor lifestyle choices. The Badass Body Diet is the solution, packed with information on how to:Select the right proteins, fats, and carbs—otherwise known as "booty foods." Learn how to eat for your body type and fitness goals. Get targeted, powerful, total body workouts in just a few minutes a day. Improve your posture and functional mobility and enhance your overall health. Clear up cellulite with dietary advice, workout strategies, and other proven tips.Based on her work with hundreds of clients at her CrossFit gyms and nationwide fitness boot camps, Christmas offers specific, detailed plans for every goal, whether it's losing weight, taking an already fit frame to the next level, or building luscious curves on a "skinny fat" body. She'll give you the tools and motivation you need to build a healthy, vital body—with the tight, firm tush you've always wanted!

In the months leading up to March 2003, fresh from its swift and heady victory in Afghanistan, the Bush administration mobilized the United States armed forces to overthrow the government of Iraq. Eight months after the president declared an end to major combat operations, Saddam Hussein was captured in a farmhouse in Al-Dawr. And yet neither peace nor democracy has taken hold in Iraq; instead the country has plunged into terrorist insurgency and guerrilla warfare, with no end in sight.What went wrong?In The Secret History of the Iraq War, bestselling author Yossef Bodansky offers an astonishing new account of the war and its aftermath a war that was doomed from the start, he argues, by the massive and systemic failures of the American intelligence community. Drawing back the curtain of politicized debate, Bodansky a longtime expert and director of the Congressional Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare reveals that nearly every aspect of America's conflict with Iraq has been misunderstood, in both the court of public opinion and the White House itself. Among his revelations: The most authoritative account of Saddam Hussein's support for Islamic terrorist organizations including extensive new reporting on his active cooperation with al-Qaeda in Iraq long after the fall of Baghdad Extensive new information on Iraq's major chemical and biological weapons programs including North Korea's role in building still-undetected secret storage facilities and Iraq's transfer of banned materials to Syria, Iran, and Libya The first account of Saddam's plan for Iraq, Syria, and Iran to join Yasser Arafat's Palestinian forces to attack Israel, throw the region into turmoil, and upend the American campaign The untold story of Russia's attempt to launch a coup against Saddam before the war and how the CIA thwarted it by ensuring that Iraq was forewarned Dramatic details about Saddam's final days on the run, including the untold story of a near miss with U.S. troops and the stunning revelation that Saddam was already in custody at the time of his capture and was probably betrayed by members of his own Tikriti clan The definitive account of the anti-U.S. resistance and uprising in Iraq, as the American invasion ignited an Islamic jihad and Iran-inspired intifada, threatening to plunge the region into irreversible chaos fueled by hatred and revenge Revelations about the direct involvement of Osama bin Laden in the terrorism campaigns in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the Middle East including the major role played by Iran and HizbAllah in al-Qaeda's operations Drawing upon an extraordinary wealth of previously untapped intelligence and regional sources, The Secret History of the Iraq War presents the most detailed, fascinating, and convincing account of the most controversial war of our times and offers a sobering indictment of an intelligence system that failed the White House, the American military, and the people of the Middle East.