Back-in-print early work by the author of subUrbia and Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll.

    Dear Mr. Ted, contains all four books.Dear Teddy Book One -Little boy little boy,Curled in a ball.I know your secrets,I know them allI write in my journal as much as I can. I talk to Mr. Ted. He is my only friend. He understands when the bad man comes. He holds my hand when I have nightmares and my mummy doesn't hear me cry. Mr. Ted doesn’t tell. He won’t say when my daddy hurts me. He keeps my secrets and my stories. I love Mr. Ted. He is the only one who loves me back.Mr. Ted.I keep falling asleep. Bad things happen. I get sore all the time. But I don’t know why. My mum says it’s a demon. Because I got evil. Please make me be good....Where does an abused child turn when he has no one to talk to? Believing that he is evil and meant to be a victim, he tells his horrific journey to his only friend, Mr. Ted. The boy is five. In his own words through the compelling pages of his journal, he writes in terrific detail of unspeakable abuse forced upon him by his parents. Through manipulation and control, he is moulded into a creation of their own design. Fear follows close behind in the guise of the “bad man.”His voice is no longer silent.Telling Teddy Book Two-Mr. Ted. I love you very much.I love my Mr. Ted. He is all mine and he is magic. He keeps me safe from the bad man. I hug him all tight. We sit on the floor by the fire. I don't be allowed to sit on the chairs. I am too evil.Me and Mr. Ted like to write stories. He tells me what to write. Then I draw the pictures about it and we make it all nice. I put it in my scrap book. My Nan bought me the scrap book. It is big and has lots of pages. It has a car on the front and my name.Stupid Boy Book Three -Stupid Boy, the sequel to the #1 ranked book, Dear Teddy and Telling Teddy.” I am a stupid boy, with stupid hair and stupid clothes. I am always stupid, forever. My badness comes out and makes it all stupid. I don’t tell Mr. Ted though. He is my friend. We go outside and we get to play. We chop up all the bad people with our swords. We play with Andrew too. He is magic, he is invisible. He doesn’t know that I am Stupid Boy. Nobody ever wants Stupid Boy.”Stupid Boy is the third instalment of Dear Teddy, and continues the pain-filled journey of a seven-year old boy through his horrific childhood of abuse. In his own words, he shows you his scars and tells you the lies that he believes; every page an accounting of the deliberate destruction of a child by those he loves and the strangers he is forced to please.His gentle spirit will reach out and amaze you with its strength. Wrap your arms around him as he opens his heart once more and shares his life with you.His story continues…Goodbye Teddy Book Four -This journey has been an odd one; I didn’t even know I was on it. Dear Teddy was born out of a conversation with my therapist at the time, a way for the child to speak after so many years of silence and being locked away in the dark. Once I gave him a pen and told him it was okay for him to talk, he didn’t stop. He had so much to say, and he did.Goodbye Teddy is the fourth and final book in the Dear Teddy series, as with the previous books; it is told through the eyes of the child. He asks you to walk with him as he shows you his world. This is a tale of child abuse in all forms. Every page takes you through the horrific events and the ways he came to survive them. It shows you the betrayal by those very people that should have protected him; his mother and father.Listen as he shares his secrets, his fears, his hopes and dreams. Laugh with him, cry with him, but don’t stop or close your eyes.ExcerptI sit on the cushions. I look at my dad’s bottle of petrol. Maybe I can drink it. It is poison. My dad says it is. He shouts when my brother plays in there. Because there is lots of things and it is poison and can make him die and go to heaven. I look at it lots of times. Maybe I can drink it all

    But she’s the only one strong enough to break the family cycle.In Depression-era Mississippi, Millie Reynolds longs to escape the madness that marks her world. With an abusive father and a “nothing mama,” she struggles to find a place where she really belongs. For answers,Millie turns to the Gypsies who caravan through town each spring. The travelers lead Millie to a key that unlocks generations of shocking family secrets. When tragedy strikes, the mysterious contents of the box give Millie the tools she needs to break her family’s longstanding cycle of madness and abuse. Through it all, Millie experiences the thrill of first love while fighting to trust the God she believes has abandoned her. With the power of forgiveness, can Millie finally make her way into the free?Saturated in Southern ambiance and written in the vein of other Southern literary bestsellers like The Help by Kathryn Stockett and CrookedLetter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin, Julie Cantrell has created Into theFree—now a New York Times bestseller—a story that will sweep you away long after the novel ends.

    . .Annette Goode is a shy, awkward, overweight child with a terrible secret. Frightened and ashamed, Annette withdraws into a world of books and food. But the summer Annette turns thirteen, something incredible happens: Rhoda Nelson chooses her as a friend. Dazzling, generous Rhoda, who is everything Annette is not--gorgeous, slim, and worldly--welcomes Annette into the heart of her eccentric family, which includes her handsome and dignified father;her lovely, fragile "Muh'Dear;" her brooding, dangerous brother Jock;and her colorful white relatives--half-crazy Uncle Johnny, sultry Aunt Lola, and scary, surly Granny Goose.With Rhoda's help, Annette survives adolescence and blossoms as a woman. But when her beautiful best friend makes a stunning confession about a horrific childhood crime, Annette's world will never be the same."A coming-of-age journey depicted with wit, poignancy and bite." --Publishers Weekly

    

    Their actions have shown how scheming they truly are. Of course, they are no more manipulative than Cedric, who lies in a hospital bed, clinging to life. The person who attempted to silence him is now behind bars, but just because one scorned woman is out of the picture, it doesn’t mean he’s in the clear. He may not be able to utilize his joystick for a while, but his millions are still in play. Evelyn is eager to get her hands on his money, and pregnant with his child, she envisions a bright future ahead. She has a serious need for greed—greed that also makes her hungry for Trina’s beau, Keith. He displays a deep concern for the troublesome BFF’s, but his involvement may have him confessing to Trina that whatever Evelyn wants, she will eventually get.

    . . The daughter of two Hollywood superstars, Divine Matthews-Hardison lives the privileged life most fifteen-year-olds only dream of: she's all about designer clothes, awards ceremonies, parties, and having a name that opens doors. Divine could be a model, an actress, anything she wants. But when you live in the spotlight, there's nowhere to hide when your family falls apart. Her father is in trouble with the law, her mother has her own demons, and no one has room for Divine -- no one except her uncle, a Georgia pastor with a modest country home and a big heart. . . . but can Divine ever forgive? Divine can't believe she's been sent to live with her mom's family in the sticks. Doing chores, getting an allowance, and church-going are hardly what she's used to, and she lets everyone -- from her patient Uncle Reed and Aunt Phoebe to her cousins, Alyssa and Chance -- know she's not trading in her Gucci bags for a feedbag any time soon. But as the love and faith of a good family take hold in her heart, miraculous changes start to occur. And when the chance comes to return to her high-flying life, Divine is faced with her toughest decision: Now that she's found the one thing she's never had, could she ever leave it behind?

    Intrigue. Murder. New York Times bestselling author Eric Jerome Dickey once again "pushes romance and deceit to the next level" (USA Weekend), in this tantalizing tale of a high- profile marriage rocked by an unhappy accident: infidelity. James Thicke is a man whose mysterious past runs as deep as his violent streak. He's channeled the intensity of his soul into twin passions-success as a screenwriter, and marriage to movie actress Regina Baptiste. In the midst of filming his latest script, starring Regina and leading man Johnny Bergs, James receives a video of his wife caught in the most compromising of situations.Hours later, the clip of the on-set infidelity has hit the Internet and gone viral in the blogosphere and across all channels of social media. James responds to the affront by savagely attacking Johnny Bergs, and the spectacle has both the paparazzi and the police amassing at the married couple's estate. James goes on the run, but only as far as the city of Downey, California. As James tries to protect Regina from Hollywood's underbelly, lust, blackmail, and revenge become his constant companions. Does an accidental affair spell permanent danger?An Accidental Affair has the eroticism of Pleasure, the intrigue of Thieves' Paradise, the relentless pacing of Drive Me Crazy, and a female lead as complex as Genevieve.

    His rise was fast and he enjoyed all the luxuries of his hustle, including the fly chick on his arm. But his reign is short lived. Now he is in prison on a bogus murder conviction and everything he had is gone, including his woman.Beautiful and ambitious Lieutenant Nicole Wright is the fantasy of every convict at Georgia State Prison where she works. The furthest thought from her mind is falling in love with a convict. She is married to a successful doctor, and though their marriage is absent of passion, Nicole is content until she meets Prince. A hot, fascinating, but dangerous relationship kicks off threatening to explode at every turn. Will Nicole be able to ride for Prince like he needs her to? Will his bitterness engulf her into its flames? Will loving a thug cost Nicole to lose everything, including her life? The answers lie within as she and Prince embark on a journey that is truly A Dirty South Love.

    Thereafter, he was his worst enemy. A tough-as-nails father who firmly enforces his old-fashioned ways, a mother who has little or no say, and a son with a penchant for getting into misadventures. The boy tries to convince his parents that something is wrong with him, and he is really physically ill. He suffers three years of humiliation, agony, and punishment from the school and his father. The school principal, gave him swats, detention and isolation, where he spent all day locked up in an empty storage room. His emotionally unstable father spanked him ferociously. The boy was also whipped shirtless with his shorts on leaving him with welts all over his body from head to toe. He suffered other cruel punishments as well. The school and his parents misjudge him almost costing him his life. The parents get a divorce. The mother and brothers moved back to Wisconsin from Texas. They found themselves in an all-black housing project, being the only whites there for almost four years. He grows up quick and learns that life isn't as simple as black and white. When he turns 18, he decides to move back to Texas to seek vengeance from his father in a small country town with his father and his new mother. He hasn't seen or talked to his father in almost four years. Things fall apart fast. The young man and his younger brother end up out on the streets being homeless for two months and encounters unpredictable adventures. A raw, uncut true story.

    He is about to retire from the game with the beautiful Lisa, a sista he loves and adores. She feels the same for Slim but that love is put to the test when an old flame steps back into her life and he is also rich--seven figure professional athlete rich. Will she succumb to the old flame that's burning or will she stay loyal?Finally there is Myte--a sexy Latina who is conniving and out to get paid. She beds one of Slim's most trusted men and it doesn't take long before she has him stealing from the crew. With the DEA and Chicago Police on everyone's trail, Myte and the Latin Kings' top dog, Felix, orchestrate the heist of a million dollars from Slim--a Chicago based mob outfit's million--and it causes the death of one of Slim's most trusted soldiers. Slim is devastated and exacts his revenge on all that weren't loyal and no one on the streets of Chicago or Gary is safe.

    

    This monthly Urban Soap, "Single Ladies" takes you to a whole nother level of play. There will be no holding back, no biting of the tongue and best believe the gloves are coming off when five childhood friends take you through the everyday life of living as a female in the hood. Expect everything... But boredom!!!

    He's smart, successful, happily-married-and has the best of everything. But ambitious business executive Ryan can't stop thinking about the woman he can't have: Olivia. She's his friend, his co-worker...and his best friend Miles's wife. It only takes one irresistible moment, one luscious taste, to ignite their relationship into an insatiable fire... CAN BECOME YOUR WORST NIGHTMARES... But Ryan's erotic fantasies are slowly unraveling his career, marriage, and friendships as he discovers his mind-blowing tryst was nothing more than a treacherous charade. Now his obsession and sexual escapades threaten to ruin all he's worked so hard for, trapping him deeper into a web of illicit desire, deceit, and danger...

    This Essence bestseller from an author to watch takes an unforgettable look at love, lust, and secrets that can break hearts--and destroy homes.