Amaranth accompanies Rod on his trip back to the Wasteland where he hope to reunite with his mother before he dies.

    The time: closer than we may realize.Unemployment is in high double-digits. The acrid stench of civil war smokes the air. The 1930s Great Depression all over . . . just a little more high-tech.Arch and Tess Uglias are blue-collar residents of the desolate Rust Belt city of Gary, Indiana. Arch, an unemployed auto-plant worker and ex-race car driver, and Tess, an unemployed nurse, are both staring homelessness and starvation in face.Meanwhile, Frank Regis, an aging disciple of the legendary bank robber Willie Sutton, is masterminding a string of bank robberies throughout Indiana. The Regis gang is a fractious collage of professional criminals, like Frank, and once law-abiding folks who have turned to crime out of desperation.After one of their drivers is killed during a getaway, the Regis gang goes in search of a replacement, a road that leads them to Arch Uglias. Though a law-abiding citizen and square guy his whole life, Arch, like some of the other gang members, feels compelled to take the wheel. And Tess becomes an outspoken, unwilling, uncooperative part of the package.From there, it’s a boisterous, bawdy and dangerous drive through a desperate world for the Regis gang, from the ruins of the Midwest to the ruins of the West Coast with ruthless law enforcement in pursuit and mistrust and murder blossoming among them. In the end, the war that has been raging at the edges suddenly draws them into its bloody vortex, leading to a fierce climax of double cross and desperate escape.“The Uglies,” an original screenplay by Thomas Burchfield (“Dragon’s Ark,” “Whackers”), drives the same perilous roads as such classics as “Bonnie and Clyde” and “The Getaway. It is a wild, bawdy, and action-packed saga about crime and pursuit, friendship and survival. It’s also the story of people who realize the need to stick together as the world around them falls to pieces.

    

    Little do they know that the unsuspecting, yet odd-looking turtle, is a fiend in disguise. The town bully, Victor Lockett, kidnaps the reptile and finds out he’s made a terrible, terrible mistake! The turtle is now on the loose and the killings begin. Elmer Jacks, the pet shop proprietor, finally reveals the true identity of the turtle to the two boys. He says there is an old scroll that was lost which holds the answer to the cursed tortoise and can revert it back to human form. Charlie’s pretty neighbor, Sunni Russell, joins them on their hunt for the beast. With her help, they search the Internet for the answer to the reversal of the curse. But will they find it? And most importantly, if they find the turtle, will the special words on the scroll even work?

    My disability gave me the ability to understand and help others. And now I finally feel like I am living. 17-year-old Lewis Hine is a global phenomenon. Diagnosed with a life-threatening brain tumour and water on the brain at 17 months, he wasn't expected to survive. But Lewis proved everyone wrong; he's not only surviving but thriving. In one Facebook post on his 16th birthday Lewis invited everyone to see how he faces head on the challenges from his ongoing illness, and he went viral. 30 million views later, Lewis now spearheads a campaign, Friend Finder, to make sure no one ever faces childhood illness alone. In his memoir, Lewis reaches out to anyone who may feel isolated in their lives. After 13 brain surgeries and continual health problems, life for Lewis is a daily challenge. From the sheer physical challenges - he is at high risk of sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP) and has a pump in his brain just to keep him alive - to the horrendous bullying he's endured, he shares how he finds the strength to overcome all this and still lead a fun and fulfilling life. With a host of admirers around the world from Elton John to Kid Ink, Lewis is living his dream - even becoming Radio 1's Teen Hero of the Year. His story will make you laugh, cry and above all, feel inspired by life's endless possibilities, looking at the stars.

    Jack Parker has been content to go through middle school in a SPED small group class for the last two years and stay off the radar of the bullies in his school. While life at Hickory Hills Middle School has been safe for Jack, it has also gotten a bit dull with only four classmates (all boys) to spend the school day with. All of that changes in Jack's eighth grade year when girls and trouble show up in his small group class. Fast paced and funny, SPED tells the story of Jack and his classmates as he handles bullies at school and challenges at home and learns that growing up means taking chances - not only for himself but for those he cares about.

    Gifted with the unusual ability to weave time with matter, sixteen-year-old Adelice Lewys is exactly what the Guild is looking for, and in the world of Arras, being chosen as a Spinster is everything a girl could want. It means privilege, eternal beauty, and being something other than a secretary. It also mean the power to embroider the fabric of life. But Adelice isn't interested. Because once you become a Spinster, there's no turning back.

     After my first escape, I realized that everything I'd believed, everything the Elders told us, and everything I thought I knew were all calculated lies. Now I know the truth will set me free.

    an empty life without Christ and a meaningful one with Him. Through Caitlin's candid journal entries we see her grapple with such universal teen issues as peer pressure, loyalty, conflict with parents, the longing for a boyfriend, and her own spirituality.It's My LifeCaitlin O'Conner faces new trials as she grows in her faith and strives to maintain the recent commitments she's made to God. As a new believer, Caitlin begins her summer job and makes preparations for a Mexico mission trip with her church youth group. Torn between new spiritual directions and loyalty to Beanie, her best friend (now pregnant), Caitlin searches out her personal values on friendship, romance, dating, life goals, and key relationships with God and family. Tough choices threaten her progress, and her year climaxes in her realization that maturity sometimes means life-impacting decisions must be made ... by faith alone.Who I AmIt's challenging enough to be a normal high school senior -- but Caitlin O'Conner has a host of new difficulties to deal with in the third book of Melody Carlson's widely popular and fascinating teen series. Time is critical to help the orphans in Mexico, missions-minded Caitlin believes, but Mom and Dad are set on her attending college. Meanwhile, her relationship with Josh takes on a serious tone via e-mail -- threatening her commitment to "kiss dating goodbye." When Beanie begins dating an African-American, Caitlin's concern over dating seems to be misread as racism. One thing is obvious: God is at work through this dynamic girl in very real but puzzling ways. A soul-stretching time of racial reconciliation at school and within her church helps her discover God's will as never before.

    Mortal Engines Quartet: 4 books - Mortal Engines / Predators Gold / Infernal Devices / A Darkling Plain

    Reissued in the Jean Ure branding.“People always fall out after they’re married. I’m going to stay single.”Jasmine, Laurel, Rose and Daisy. Four very different sisters, four very different attitudes! As if living with each other wasn’t bad enough, living with their parents is worse – particularly parents who are both actors. Please!But after the Great Row, the girls find themselves living with Mum, while Dad has gone to America to find work. How are the sisters going to achieve their own personal ambitions: become an actress, model, writer, vet… when they can’t even achieve their joint ambition – to reunite parents who are on different continents?

    As she grows up, a Mormon girl learns that lasting friendships, hidden talents, and faith in God are some of life's most precious gifts.

    All the humans outside the Compound have either been killed or turned. Those living inside are starving. Everything else lies in ruin. The future has changed. And so has Eve. Will she be strong enough to stop Victor and Kael before they destroy them all? Or will she become the monster foretold in the past, and singlehandedly usher in a new age of terror?

    We hope you like your present…” Cynical, solitary Stanly Bird is a fairly typical teenager – unless you count the fact that his best friend is a talking beagle named Daryl, and that he gained the powers of flight and telekinesis when he turned sixteen. Unfortunately, his rural Welsh home town is not exactly crying out for its very own superhero. London is calling – but what Stanly finds there is a good deal weirder and more terrifying than anything he could have imagined. Perhaps he should have stayed in Wales … Winner of the Dylan Thomas Prize for new writers.

    In the wake of World War III, which decimated most of the world’s population, the remaining survivors vowed to not continue to repeat the same mistakes of the past. Fortunately, they had something previous generations did not have – advanced technology.The year is 2117 and this once shattered civilization has become prosperous again. Innovative forms of technology have enabled them to abandon the old model and re-engineer a better way of living for all. Brain implants and genetic modifications have made an entire population educated, healthy, and kind.Despite the benefits of this technology, it has created some unforeseen side effects that threaten humankind’s existence. When technology proves to be inept at solving the world’s problem, a new hope emerges in the unlikeliest form – a young orphan girl.