In The Sweet Hereafter, Russell Banks tells a story that begins with a school bus accident. Using four different narrators, Banks creates a small-town morality play that addresses one of life's most agonizing questions: when the worst thing happens, who do you blame?

Four of the five daughters of England's Queen Victoria and Prince Albert were regal, genteel, and everything a princess should be. But one was rebellious, scandalous, and untamed.This is her story. . . . To the court and subjects of Queen Victoria, young Princess Louise—later the Duchess of Argyll—was the "Wild One." Proud and impetuous, she fought the constraints placed on her and her brothers and sisters, dreamed of becoming an artist, and broke with a three-hundred-year-old tradition by marrying outside of the privileged circle of European royals. Some said she wed for love. Others whispered of a scandal covered up by the Crown. It will take a handsome American, recruited by the queen's elite Secret Service, to discover the truth. But even as Stephen Byrne—code name the Raven—vows to risk his life to protect the royal family from violent Irish radicals, he tempts Louise with a forbidden love that could prove just as dangerous.In the vein of Philippa Gregory, Mary Hart Perry tells the riveting story of an extraordinary woman—a princess who refused to give up on her dreams, including her right to true love.

In Undercurrent, Paul Blackwell's fast-paced teen thriller, sixteen-year-old Callum Harris survives a plummet over a waterfall but wakes to find himself in a life that's totally different from the one he knew.His parents were separated. Now they're together. His brother, Cole, was a sports star. Now he's paralyzed. And Callum, who used to be quiet and sort of unpopular, is suddenly a jock with two hot girls after him. But there's one difference that matters more than all the others combined: His former best friend wants Callum dead. And he isn't the only one.Tense and original, Undercurrent is a psychological thrill ride with sci-fi elements that will appeal to fans of Neal Shusterman. The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books said, "the riveting opening and intense final scene will keep genre fans satisfied and breathless," while ALA Booklist called it "a menacing, suspenseful thriller."

The seventeen original stories in Defy the Dark, an eerie, mind-bending YA anthology, could only take place in darkness.?Open the pages and discover: A creepy guy who stares too long. The secrets of the core of the earth. Dreams of other people’s lives. A girl who goes mad in the darkness. Monsters in Bavaria. A generational spaceship where night doesn’t exist. And other mysteries and oddities.?The contributors to the enthralling collection are: Sarah Rees Brennan, Tessa Gratton, Rachel Hawkins, Christine Johnson, Valerie Kemp, Malinda Lo, Myra McEntire, Saundra Mitchell, Sarah Ockler, Jackson Pearce, Aprilynne Pike, Dia Reeves, Beth Revis, Carrie Ryan, Jon Skovron, Courtney Summers, and Kate Espy, winner of the Defy the Dark new author contest.

This selection from award-winning health pioneer Ann Louise Gittleman's Zapped tells you how to protect yourself from the hazards of electromagnetic pollution in the one place you should feel safe—your own home.We are all affected by the electromagnetic forces in our world—whether from our cell phones or from the electrical outlets in our walls. Author Ann Louise Gittleman proposes that we're being zapped by high levels of electromagnetic fields, and the wavelengths and frequencies they produce have reached the point of toxicity—making us feel tired, irritable, and weak.In this eSelect, you learn about the strength and location of harmful electromagnetic fields in your home. With step-by-step instruction, the author walks you room-by-room, teaching you how to remake the force fields in your environment and create positive energy flow.

The fresh new handbook on how to achieve and maintain stylish natural hair, from the savviest and most revered expert on coils and curlsThese days there's a revolution going on. Relaxers are out. Weaves are so yesterday. Tired of damage from expensive chemical treatments and artificial enhancers, women of color are going natural thanks to Nikki Walton of CurlyNikki.com, the natural hair blogger and online hair therapy expert.In Better Than Good Hair, this gifted "curl whisperer" educates women on how to transition from relaxed to completely natural hair, with advice and styles for every length—from Fierce Braid-and-Curls to Fancy Faux Buns. She also counsels those considering the "big chop"—cutting it all off at once to sport a bold and beautiful "teeny weeny afro." Here, too, is essential?guidance for parents of mixed-race children dealing with new and unfamiliar hair textures and styles.Combining Walton's expansive knowledge with tips from other experts in the field, Better Than Good Hair includes:Product recommendationsHome hair care recipesAdvice for parents on how to manage their children's natural hair Tips for using henna on gray hair Guidance on dealing with?detractors Step-by-step illustrated directions for nearly two dozen hairdos, from frohawks to twist-outsFull of indispensable information, as empowering as it is accessible, and with a foreword by actress and comedian Kim Wayans, Better Than Good Hair is a must-have natural hair care bible that will help women of all ages and styles achieve their natural beauty.

As the summer of 2004 draws to a close, Archy Stallings and Nat Jaffe are still hanging in there—longtime friends, bandmates, and co-regents of Brokeland Records, a kingdom of used vinyl located in the borderlands of Berkeley and Oakland. Their wives, Gwen Shanks and Aviva Roth-Jaffe, are the Berkeley Birth Partners, two semi-legendary midwives who have welcomed more than a thousand newly minted citizens into the dented utopia at whose heart—half tavern, half temple—stands Brokeland.When ex–NFL quarterback Gibson Goode, the fifth-richest black man in America, announces plans to build his latest Dogpile megastore on a nearby stretch of Telegraph Avenue, Nat and Archy fear it means certain doom for their vulnerable little enterprise. Meanwhile, Aviva and Gwen also find themselves caught up in a battle for their professional existence, one that tests the limits of their friendship. Adding another layer of complication to the couples' already tangled lives is the surprise appearance of Titus Joyner, the teenage son Archy has never acknowledged and the love of fifteen-year-old Julius Jaffe's life.An intimate epic, a NorCal Middlemarch set to the funky beat of classic vinyl soul-jazz and pulsing with a virtuosic, pyrotechnical style all its own, Telegraph Avenue is the great American novel we've been waiting for. Generous, imaginative, funny, moving, thrilling, humane, triumphant, it is Michael Chabon's most dazzling book yet.

Don’t miss out on an exciting new My Weird School ebook collection, complete with the first four books in Dan Gutman’s seriously hilarious and seriously zany series. The collection includes My Weird School #1: Miss Daisy Is Crazy!, My Weird School #2: Mr. Klutz Is Nuts!, My Weird School #3: Mrs. Roopy Is Loopy!, My Weird School #4: Ms. Hannah Is Bananas!, and a bunch of seriously strange activities. The activities include a checklist, a maze, and a word scramble.Meet a teacher who eats bonbons, a principal who kisses pigs, a librarian who thinks she's George Washington, and an art teacher who dresses up in pot holders! They're all inside this collection! They must be getting pretty crowded in there!

Travel the world with 100 healthy, delicious, and simple recipes in this beautiful, evocative cookbookWs a personal chef to Diane von Furstenberg aboard the designer’s spectacular sailing yacht, Eos, Jane Coxwell has traveled to the far corners of the globe. Gathering inspiration from Southeast Asia, New Zealand, Australia, Papua New Guinea, French Polynesia, the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, Central America, and her homeland of South Africa, Jane’s delectable recipes can truly be called world food. Full of light, lively flavors, the freshest ingredients, and a down-to-earth attitude, and illustrated with dozens of lushly intimate photographs from Jane’s travels, Fresh Happy Tasty is the perfect way to share fabulous food and good times. Jane’s low-key approach applies to both her cooking and everyday life. The most delicious dishes, she believes, are created with fresh food that looks good, tastes great, and is thoughtfully prepared. Never extravagant or ornamental, Jane’s recipes are meant to inspire the freedom to create and enjoy cooking. Fresh Happy Tasty offers 100 of Jane’s favorite light and luscious recipes, including:Bright Green Pea Salad with Lemon and MintHerb, Lemon, and Caper Stuffed TroutHoney Poached PineappleCape Malay Lamb CurryBrussels Sprouts and Oyster Mushrooms with Pine NutsIsraeli Couscous with Shrimp and ZucchiniLobster QuinoaMiddle Eastern Watermelon SaladEnjoy wonderful flavors from around the world with Fresh Happy Tasty!

No matter what your age or your family and medicalhistory, you can take steps to prevent debilitatingstrokes. And you can start today.No one plans to have a stroke, but too many people think that avoiding them is impossible. Written by the director of the Stroke Research Center at Mayo Clinic, this book helps you determine your risk for stroke and offers you a personalized prevention program based on your own risk profile.This book is the first of its kind to offer such thorough information about our nation's #1 disabler and #3 killer. Based on decades of research, Dr. Wiebers shares crucial information you need to know, including: The six different types of stroke Simple dietary changes that can help prevent stroke Common heart conditions that are little-known stroke risk factors Where to get the best treatment during a strokeYou and your loved ones don't have to live in fear of suffering strokes. This book gives you specific, positive steps to reduce the risk of stroke and to help you lead a more healthy, balanced, and enjoyable life.

What happened to Eden?The New York Times bestselling author of Ahab's Wife, Four Spirits, and Abundance returns with an audacious and provocative novel that envisions a world where science and faith contend for the allegiance of a new Adam & EveHer books have been hailed as "exceptional" (People); "enchanting" (Entertainment Weekly); "of great cultural and historical importance" (New York Times Book Review); and "original and affecting" (Los Angeles Times). One of the most imaginative and inspired writers of our time, Sena Jeter Naslund masterfully uses her craft to lay bare the poignant complexity of humanity—the passion and despair, the ignorance and frailty, the genius and resilience that define us. From Victorian London to civil-rights-era Alabama, from nineteenth-century New England to revolutionary Paris, her novels offer profound insight and startling truths about human experience. Now, with Adam & Eve, she delivers her most ambitious and encompassing tale to date.Hours before his untimely—and highly suspicious—death, world-renowned astrophysicist Thom Bergmann shares his discovery of extraterrestrial life with his wife, Lucy. Feeling that the warring world is not ready to learn of—or accept—proof of life elsewhere in the universe, Thom entrusts Lucy with his computer flash drive, which holds the keys to his secret work.Devastated by Thom's death, Lucy keeps the secret, but Thom's friend, anthropologist Pierre Saad, contacts Lucy with an unusual and dangerous request about another sensitive matter. Pierre needs Lucy to help him smuggle a newly discovered artifact out of Egypt: an ancient codex concerning the human authorship of the Book of Genesis. Offering a reinterpretation of the creation story, the document is sure to threaten the foundation of the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religions . . . and there are those who will stop at nothing to suppress it. Midway through the daring journey, Lucy's small plane goes down on a slip of verdant land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in the Middle East. Burned in the crash landing, she is rescued by Adam, a delusional American soldier whose search for both spiritual and carnal knowledge has led to madness. Blessed with youth, beauty, and an unsettling innocence, Adam gently tends to Lucy's wounds, and in this quiet, solitary paradise, a bond between the unlikely pair grows. Ultimately, Lucy and Adam forsake their half-mythical Eden and make their way back toward civilization, where members of an ultraconservative religious cult are determined to deprive the world of the knowledge Lucy carries.Set against the searing debate between evolutionists and creationists, Adam & Eve expands the definition of a "sacred book," and suggests that true madness lies in wars and violence fueled by all religious literalism and intolerance. A thriller, a romance, an adventure, and an idyll, Adam & Eve is a tour de force by a master contemporary storyteller.

While the major fighting of the war moves to the south in the summer of 1779, a British force of fewer than a thousand Scottish infantry, backed by three sloops-of-war, sails to the desolate and fog-bound coast of New England. Establishing a garrison and naval base at Penobscot Bay, in the eastern province of Massachusetts that would become Maine, the Scots—the only British troops between Canada and New York—harry rebel privateers and give shelter to American loyalists. In response, Massachusetts sends a fleet of more than forty vessels and some one thousand infantrymen to “captivate, kill or destroy” the foreign invaders. Second in command is Peleg Wadsworth, a veteran of the battles at Lexington and Long Island, once aide to General Washington, and a man who sees clearly what must be done to expel the invaders. But ineptitude and irresolution lead to a mortifying defeat—and have stunning repercussions for two men on opposite sides: an untested eighteen-year-old Scottish lieutenant named John Moore, who will begin an illustrious military career; and a Boston silversmith and patriot named Paul Revere, who will face court-martial for disobedience and cowardice.Grounded firmly in history, inimitably told in Cornwell's thrilling narrative style, The Fort is the extraordinary novel of this fascinating clash between a superpower and a nation in the making.

Fifteen-year-old Charley Thompson wants a home, food on the table, and a high school he can attend for more than part of a year. But as the son of a single father working in warehouses across the Pacific Northwest, Charley's been pretty much on his own. When tragic events leave him homeless weeks after their move to Portland, Oregon, Charley seeks refuge in the tack room of a run-down horse track. Charley's only comforts are his friendship with a failing racehorse named Lean on Pete and a photograph of his only known relative. In an increasingly desperate circumstance, Charley will head east, hoping to find his aunt who had once lived a thousand miles away in Wyoming—but the journey to find her will be a perilous one.In Vlautin's third novel, Lean on Pete, he reveals the lives and choices of American youth like Charley Thompson who were failed by those meant to protect them and who were never allowed the chance to just be a kid.

With this highly praised collection of short fiction, Lorna Goodison demonstrates why she may be one of literature's best-kept secrets. In the Pushcart Prize-winning title story, humble Dottie thinks her luck has turned when she meets Frenchie, the best-looking, if not most reliable, man in the whole of Jamaica. In "The Helpweight," an accomplished woman must bear the burden of an old flame's renewed affections when he returns from a life abroad with his Irish bride in tow. And in "Henry," a young boy turned out of his house to make way for his mother's lover sells roses on the street to survive. On a whim, he bites off a bloom, which he can feel burning inside his mouth like a red pepper light, hoping it will take root and beautify his own life. Poetically rendered, these and over a dozen other evocative stories create a world in which pride can nourish a soul or be its ruin and where people are in turn uplifted and undone by love.

When his folks host a Vietnamese family that has come to settle in their town, Harvey enjoys Americanizing twelve-year-old Tuan.

Jinx's Magic is the second book in Sage Blackwood's highly acclaimed fantasy-adventure series, Jinx. This humorous and smart tween trilogy set in a magical forest is perfect for fans of Angie Sage's Septimus Heap, Michael Buckley's the Sisters Grimm, and Brandon Mull's Fablehaven."Readers will thrill to journey with Jinx" (Jinx, School Library Journal, starred review), a daring young wizard's apprentice, as he travels from his home in the Urwald to an unfamiliar desert land in search of ancient magic. He needs that magic badly—there are forces threatening the Urwald from all sides. The more he learns, however, the clearer it becomes that this quest will require more than the magic of a solitary wizard's apprentice, and soon he'll have to call upon all of the Urwald—witches, werewolves, wizards, and trees—for help.

Mad Bean Events is on the job catering the glorious Hollywood season wrap party for the surprise hit gourmet game show, But when one of the key game show writers seems to have disappeared, Maddie′s producer friend needs a replacement -- fast. And who better to write culinary questions than MaddieWhen Maddie joins the oddball crew of game show pros, she finds she has a talent for writing clues as well as following them -- since the office she takes over offers tantalizing hints as to the whereabouts of the missing writer. And Maddie aims to hit the jackpot by answering: Who wrote off the writer?

Can the secrets of one woman's past change another woman's future?A gifted artist, Cate has come to London from New York to escape her recent past. Working for her aunt's auction house, she is sent down to Devon to value the contents of Endsleigh House, the once gracious but now crumbling estate of a former socialite. There, hidden in the back of a dusty bookshelf, Cate discovers an old shoebox. Inside is a strange assortment of objects: an exquisite pair of dancing shoes circa 1930; a diamond brooch; a photograph of a young sailor; a dance card; and a pearl and emerald Tiffanys bracelet.Intrigued by her find, Cate sets out to solve the mystery of the box, becoming immersed in the story of its owner, Baby Blythe. Bright, beautiful, and reckless, Baby was the most famous debutante of her generation . . . and the most dangerous. As the clues begin to reveal a shocking tale of destructive, addictive love, Cate finds herself being drawn deeper into Baby's tragic life story—a story that will force Cate to face some dark truths about her own.Includes an excerpt from The Perfume Collector.

The Secret of WritingIts misleading to think of writers as special creatures, word sorcerers who possess some sort of magic knowledge hidden from everyone else. Writers are ordinary people who like to write. They feel the urge to write, and scratch that itch every chance they have. Writers get their ideas down on paper using particular strategies that seem to work for them. These strategies are available to anyone who wants to be a writer... Revealed!There is no secret. But there is a process. If you like to write, there are definite steps you can take to help you reach your goals. Good writing isn't forged by magic or hatched out of thin air. Good writing happens when human beings follow particular steps to take control o their sentences-to make their words do what they want them to do.This book will show you how writers work, how you can become a writer, and how you can find a process that works for you

Maybe you've heard before that poetry is magic, and it made you roll your eyes, but I believe it's true. Poetry matters. At the most important moments, when everyone else is silent, poetry rises to speak.I wrote this book to help you write poems and to give practical ideas for making your poems sound the way you want them to sound. We're not going to smash poems up into the tiniest pieces. This book is about writing poetry, not analyzing it. I want this book to help you have more wonderful. moments in the poetry you write. I want you to feel the power of poetry. it's my hope that through this book you will discover lots of ways to make your poems shine, sing, soar...-- Ralph Fletcher

Writers are like other people, except for at least one important difference. Other people have daily thoughts and feelings, notice this sky or that smell, but they don't do much about it. Not writers. Writers react. And writers need a place to record those reactions. That's what a writer's notebook is for. It gives you a place to write down what makes you angry or sad or amazed, to write down what you noticed and don't want to forget . . . .