It was about two women, and they fell in love with each other.” And then Lily asked the question that had taken root in her, that was even now unfurling its leaves and demanding to be shown the sun: “Have you ever heard of such a thing?”Seventeen-year-old Lily Hu can’t remember exactly when the question took root, but the answer was in full bloom the moment she and Kathleen Miller walked under the flashing neon sign of a lesbian bar called the Telegraph Club.America in 1954 is not a safe place for two girls to fall in love, especially not in Chinatown. Red-Scare paranoia threatens everyone, including Chinese Americans like Lily. With deportation looming over her father—despite his hard-won citizenship—Lily and Kath risk everything to let their love see the light of day.

    Jody is in his forties and runs a map store. Not one for the outside world, he stays in his store all the time. His friend, Carl is in his late thirties and has been bringing chairs of dead friends into Jody's store and leaving them there. When Jody needs to take an AIDS test, Carl tries to convince him it is not only okay to leave the store, but also that he must take responsibility for his life. If he doesn't, he will join the set of chairs that Carl has taken great pains to place in the right spots around the store. Jody finally leaves the map store to take his HIV test and return to find Carl sitting in a chair of his own. With this gesture, we know that Carl has joined the many of their friends who have died, but now Jody must take Carl's place as the caretaker.

    She’d rather wear sweats, build furniture, and get into trouble with her solid group of friends: Woods, Mash, Davey, Fifty, and Janie Lee.But when Janie Lee confesses to Billie that she’s in love with Woods, Billie’s filled with a nagging sadness as she realizes that she is also in love with Woods…and maybe with Janie Lee, too.Always considered “one of the guys,” Billie doesn’t want anyone slapping a label on her sexuality before she can understand it herself. So she keeps her conflicting feelings to herself, for fear of ruining the group dynamic. Except it’s not just about keeping the peace, it’s about understanding love on her terms—this thing that has always been defined as a boy and a girl falling in love and living happily ever after. For Billie—a box-defying dynamo—it’s not that simple.Readers will be drawn to Billie as she comes to terms with the gray areas of love, gender, and friendship, in this John Hughes-esque exploration of sexual fluidity.

    Do yourself a favor and check out Neon Fever Dream." -Popular Science A dark secret hides in the swirling dust and exultant revelry of Burning Man.Asha Amarasuriya is bored and struggling to get by as a martial arts instructor in Oakland. When an enigmatic seductress offers her a golden ticket, Asha decides to take a leap of faith and head to Burning Man. But there is more than meets the eye at the infamous desert pilgrimage and Asha gets sucked into a quest to unravel a sinister mystery at the heart of Black Rock City.Will Asha and her friends survive to expose the shadowy conspiracy? By the time the Man burns, their lives will have changed forever.

    While visiting, Grey must confront a painful past riddled in homophobia, secrets, religious hypocrisy and fear."-- Queerty "Anyone who has come out in small-town America will understand how difficult it is to be who you are when the majority of customers at your family restaurant are the same ones you just saw in church....Some Go Hungry is at its best when confronting religious prejudice, and is even pulse-quickening when the narrator sits through one of his friend's sermons aimed directly at him....Only someone who has grown up in rural America could write so convincingly of the pressures there. It's also refreshing to find a book that relates the experience of being gay somewhere other than in a large city."-- Gay & Lesbian Review "A gay murder mystery that takes readers from Miami Beach, Florida to Fort Sackville, Indiana, as Grey Daniels 'struggles to live his authentic, openly gay life' amidst the fundamentalist Christians in his hometown."-- Bay Area Reporter "Captivating debut...[Protagonist] Grey's tale is a lesson for us all that only when we consider our own feelings first will we find happiness--and acceptance."--Edge Media Network"Redmond's fiction isn’t an attempt to recap historical events. The fictional news reports of character Robbie Palmer's alleged murder interspersed between chapters, and the 'homophobia' that engulfs the fictional town of Fort Sackville, is a platform from which the author can express his sincere concern regarding real-life situations that occur in our modern world."-- Boomer Magazine "I was totally engrossed in what I read...An important tale that in some ways is timeless...We read of bigotry, religion, murder, and personal redemption in small-town America as told by a new writer who is a master storyteller and whom I expect to be hearing about in the near future."--Reviews by Amos Lassen"Patrick Redmond has filled his first novel with passion--the passion to tell a story that resonates far beyond the confines of the small Indiana town where it is set. Some Go Hungry tells an important tale that in some ways is timeless, and in other ways could have been ripped from today's headlines."--Mark Childress, author of Crazy in AlabamaPart of Akashic's Kaylie Jones Books imprint.Some Go Hungry is a fictional account drawn from the author's own experiences working in his family's provincial Indiana restaurant--and wrestling with his sexual orientation--in a town that was rocked by the scandalous murder of his gay high school classmate in the 1980s.Now a young man who has embraced his sexuality, Grey Daniels returns from Miami Beach, Florida, to Fort Sackville, Indiana, to run Daniels' Family Buffet for his ailing father. Understanding that knowledge of his sexuality may reap disastrous results on his family's half-century-old restaurant legacy--a popular Sunday dinner spot for the after-church crowd--Grey struggles to live his authentic, openly gay life. He is put to the test when his former high school lover--and fellow classmate of the murdered student--returns to town as the youth pastor and choir director of the local fundamentalist Christian church.Some Go Hungry is the story of a man forced to choose between the happiness of others and his own joy, all the while realizing that compromising oneself--sacrificing your soul for the sake of others--is not living, but death.

    As she searches Swanee's room for mementos of their relationship, she finds Swanee's cell phone, pinging with dozens of texts sent from a mysterious contact, L.T. The most recent text reads: "Please tell me what I did. Please, Swan. Te amo. I love you."Shocked and betrayed, Alix learns that Swanee has been leading a double life--secretly dating a girl named Liana the entire time she's been with Alix. Alix texts Liana from Swanee's phone, pretending to be Swanee in order to gather information before finally meeting face-to-face to break the news.Brought together by Swanee's lies, Alix and Liana become closer than they'd thought possible. But Alix is still hiding the truth from Liana. Alix knows what it feels like to be lied to--but will coming clean to Liana mean losing her, too?

    Not since she fled Texas to start a new life. Away from her father’s volatile temper and the ever-watchful gaze of her claustrophobically conservative small town, Nora has freed herself. She can live—and love—however she wants. The only problem is that she also left behind the one woman she can’t forget. Now tragedy calls her back home to confront her past—and reconcile her future.Sophie seems to have everything—a wonderful daughter, a successful husband and a rewarding career. Yet underneath that perfection lies an explosive secret. She still yearns for Nora—her best friend and first love—despite all the years between them. Keeping her true self hidden hasn’t been easy, but it’s been necessary. So when Sophie finds out that Nora has returned, she hopes Nora’s stay is short. The life she has built depends on it.But they both find that first love doesn’t fade easily. Memories come to light, passion ignites and old feelings resurface. As the forces of family and intolerance that once tore them apart begin to reemerge, they realize some things may never change—unless they demand it.

    Now, after breaking up with his longtime boyfriend, Smith looks back to his painfully normal childhood to see where all the trouble really began. Like every other American kid, Bob's adolescence was marked by alternating moments of blissful ignorance, hazy confusion, and humiliating self-consciousness. And in these pages, Bob evokes his youth with a vividness that will make you shudder and howl with recognition.In these hysterically humorous pages, Bob Smith introduces readers to his comically unsympathetic grandmother, who makes light of his carsickness: "Bob only throws up because he's near the window and he can"; to his first teacher crush, whose "five-o'clock shadow could plunge a room into darkness"; and to his first brush with fame, when he fainted from his chair during a biology filmstrip ("Way to go, Smith!"). Sharp, observant, ingeniously ironic and wholly satisfying, this new Lambda Award-nominated collection is at once bittersweet nostalgic fun and a testament to the unquestionable gifts of a highly original comic writer.

    The Kostrovian royal court will be saved, of course, along with their guards. But the fate of the court's Royal Flyers, a lauded fleet of aerial silk performers, is less certain. Hell-bent on survival, Principal Flyer, Natasha Koskinen, will do anything to save the Flyers, who are the only family she's ever known. Even if "anything" means molding herself into the type of girl who could be courted by Prince Nikolai. But unbeknownst to Natasha, her newest recruit, Ella Neves, is driven less by her desire to survive the floods than her thirst for revenge. And Ella's mission could put everything Natasha has worked for in peril.As the oceans rise, so too does an undeniable spark between the two flyers. With the end of the world looming, and dark secrets about the Kostrovian court coming to light, Ella and Natasha can either give in to despair . . . or find a new reason to live.

    But it's okay -- Liz has a plan that will get her out of Campbell, Indiana, forever: attend the uber-elite Pennington College, play in their world-famous orchestra, and become a doctor.But when the financial aid she was counting on unexpectedly falls through, Liz's plans come crashing down . . . until she's reminded of her school's scholarship for prom king and queen. There's nothing Liz wants to do less than endure a gauntlet of social media trolls, catty competitors, and humiliating public events, but despite her devastating fear of the spotlight she's willing to do whatever it takes to get to Pennington.The only thing that makes it halfway bearable is the new girl in school, Mack. She's smart, funny, and just as much of an outsider as Liz. But Mack is also in the running for queen. Will falling for the competition keep Liz from her dreams . . . or make them come true?A newer edition of ISBN 9781338503265 can be found here.

    She's failing pre-med and drifting apart from her best friend. One by one, Danny is losing all the underpinnings of her identity. When she finds herself attracted to an older, edgy girl who she met in rehab for an eating disorder, she finally feels like she might be finding a new sense of self. But when tragedy strikes, her self-destructive tendencies come back to haunt her as she struggles to discover who that self really is.

    Schwab's Shades of Magic trilogy and A DISCOVERY OF WITCHES.Seventeen-year-old Dayna Walsh is struggling to cope with her somatic OCD; the aftermath of being outed as bisexual in her conservative Irish town; and the return of her long-absent mother, who barely seems like a parent. But all that really matters to her is ascending and finally, finally becoming a full witch-plans that are complicated when another coven, rumored to have a sordid history with black magic, arrives in town with premonitions of death. Dayna immediately finds herself at odds with the bewitchingly frustrating Meiner King, the granddaughter of their coven leader.And then a witch turns up murdered at a local sacred site, along with the blood symbol of the Butcher of Manchester-an infamous serial killer whose trail has long gone cold. The killer's motives are enmeshed in a complex web of witches and gods, and Dayna and Meiner soon find themselves at the center of it all. If they don't stop the Butcher, one of them will be next.With razor-sharp prose and achingly real characters, E. Latimer crafts a sweeping, mesmerizing story of dark magic and brutal mythology set against a backdrop of contemporary Ireland that's impossible to put down.

     It's 1942 and Willowjean "Will" Parker is a scrappy circus runaway whose knife-throwing skills have just saved the life of New York's best, and most unorthodox, private investigator, Lillian Pentecost. When the dapper detective summons Will a few days later, she doesn't expect to be offered a life-changing proposition: Lillian's multiple sclerosis means she can't keep up with her old case load alone, so she wants to hire Will to be her right-hand woman. In return, Will will receive a salary, room and board, and training in Lillian's very particular art of investigation.Three years later, Will and Lillian are on the Collins case: Abigail Collins was found bludgeoned to death with a crystal ball following a big, boozy Halloween party at her home--her body slumped in the same chair where her steel magnate husband shot himself the year before. With rumors flying that Abigail was bumped off by the vengeful spirit of her husband (who else could have gotten inside the locked room?), the family has tasked the detectives with finding answers where the police have failed. But that's easier said than done in a case that involves messages from the dead, a seductive spiritualist, and Becca Collins--the beautiful daughter of the deceased, who Will quickly starts falling for. When Will and Becca's relationship dances beyond the professional, Will finds herself in dangerous territory, and discovers she may have become the murderer's next target.A wildly charming and fast-paced mystery written with all the panache of 1940s New York, Fortune Favors the Dead is a fresh homage to Holmes and Watson reads like the best of Dashiell Hammett and introduces an audacious detective duo for the ages.

    So far, they’re pretty simple: Finish her senior year of high school, head off to a good college, find a cute boyfriend, graduate, get a good job, get married, the whole heterosexual shebang. Nothing is going to stand in the way of that plan. Not even Stella Lewis. Stella Lewis also has a plan: Finish her senior year as cheer captain, go to college, finally let herself flirt with (and maybe even date) a girl for the first time and go from there. Fate has other plans for Kyle and Stella when they’re paired up in their AP English class and something between them ignites. It’s confusing and overwhelming and neither of them know what to do about it. One thing they do know is that their connection can’t be ignored. The timing just isn’t right. But is there ever a good time for falling in love?

    A friendship on the rocks. A heartfelt decision that has to be made. Successful film director, Hannah Richards, could never have imagined that in an blink of an eye the love of her life would be gone forever. Nor would she have ever envisaged that her late partner's best friend—the acclaimed actress Alisa Forbes, would be the one to help her pick up the pieces.