But their seemingly perfect world is ripped apart when their younger daughter, eight-year-old Brenna, runs off after overhearing her parents’ arguing. Out on the streets, she quickly realizes she’s lost. Even more frightening, Brenna soon realizes that a man is following her. Meanwhile, in a townhouse in Brooklyn, Callie Griffin is throwing a birthday party for her one-year-old son, Oliver. The joy of the day is ruined by her sister Lauren’s too short, drive-by appearance. Once close, the two sisters haven’t been able to move past a falling out which took place three years before. When Brenna notices the strange man getting closer, she panics and takes refuge in the Griffin home, befriending their four-year-old daughter, Summer, who is waiting out the party upstairs. As family and friends search for Brenna, her absence helps her father realize the importance of family, even as her presence in the Griffin home unwittingly sets in motion healing for a mother’s heart.

    Mal porque tengo miedo. Miedo porque yo era como t�, llena de ideas y verdad, y por mi sabidur�a lo perd� todo. T� no eres Malcriada. Lo que pasa es que tu sabes demasiado." __In the middle of the Caribbean Sea, aboard an illegal voyage from the Dominican Republic to Puerto Rico, a twelve year old learns her name; a former cacao farmer finds a constellation on his lover's thighs; best friends become strangers and find the essence of themselves in the face of deception; an old man exchanges his homeland for a New York City bodega storefront; preteen boys grapple with authority; female cousins come to terms with their first shared sexual experience; an alcoholic woman finds serenity at the bottom of the sea; feminism is deconstructed by opposing views; on the back of a motorcycle, self-awareness is found; and a woman discovers that healing is a series of choices.__ "My mother didn't teach me dependency, I want to yell and enunciate. I cannot force myself to need you. Mami taught me to use my tongue like a sword, and I haven't sharpened it in years. Too afraid, I find myself, to pain him, to say things that might strike him the wrong way. Some feelings just don't translate. " __ " You know that Malcriadas can love the world awake."

    collection of an extraordinary new voice in Irish drama.

    What she doesn’t know is he’s in love with her. And like Ruby, he craves success, but in hopes that it’ll make him worthy of her.In New York, they journey through the treacherous music industry. As Ruby rises to fame, they find themselves surrounded by scandals and shady icons. And when she has to battle her demons under the spotlight, what began as a dream-come-true becomes a dangerous trial to their friendship that raises the questions: how far is one willing to go to protect a friend? What if such friend commits an act that can end up with her incarceration? Finally, how do you find the power to tell someone you feel undeserving of that you love her?

    For example, in "Rebel Airplanes," an L.A. engineer works by day on city sewers and by night on R-C planes that she yearns to launch into the cosmos. The character-driven stories in Meet Behind Mars offer beautiful insight into the emotional lives of caretakers, auto workers, dancers, and pawn shop employees. In "High Country," a frustrated would-be novelist considers ditching her family in the middle of the desert. In "Dive," an adoptee returns to her adoptive home, still haunted by histories she does not know. Simms writes from the voice of women and girls who struggle under structural oppression and draws from the storytelling tradition best represented by writers like Edward P. Jones, whose characters have experiences that are specific to black Americans living in the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries. One instance of this is in "The Art of Heroine Worship," in which black families integrate into a white suburb of Detroit in the 1970s.The stories in this collection span forty years and two continents and range in structure from epistolary to traditionally structured realism, with touches of absurdity, humor, and magic. Meet Behind Mars will appeal to readers interested in contemporary literary fiction.

    Yousaf’s last collection of poetry, Sincerely. Struck by inspiration and overwhelmed by the response of dedicated fans, Yousaf wanted to continue this journey in a new collection. While tales of longing, uncertainty, and loss flow through each poem, Yousaf artfully captures the eternal question of how to face pain with courage and quiet resilience.Featuring 140 poems and accompanying illustrations, Serenity is the perfect escape from daily life, helping readers refocus energy and kindness toward themselves and their cherished relationships.

     “Sydney, order up for table two!” Who knew the road to Hollywood would be so glamorous. I’ve been working in this diner for months. My feet hurt. My arms ache. But slowly, I’m putting money away. I’ll get to California. I refuse to wind up like my mother. Head down. Work hard. Save money. It’s all going according to plan, until Jake Bishop walks in to the diner… In his game, everyone’s a pawn… “Can I get you anything else, gentlemen?” she asked with a smile. I had to touch her. I had to have her. Girls like Sydney are rare. And I will make her mine—whatever the cost. No one will get in my way. …and he’s never lost a game. Dark Bishop is unsuitable for those under the age of eighteen due to adult language and situations. It is part of serial series, which means that each part consists of approximately 15-20,000 words. Each part will build upon the last, much like the episodes of a television series. It is important to read the parts in order.

    We don’t always have a choice and sometimes fate chooses for us.”You can’t have two soul mates.And you certainly can’t have them at the same time.Or can you?Kai Ferris is wild and passionate, like an untamed stallion refusing a bridle. Henry Gerard is gentle and warm, perfect like a mug of hot cider on a crisp autumn day.Both men love me.But I must choose.There are two sides to this story.I'm sharing mine.If you think this is about a love triangle, you’d be wrong.

    Fifteen-year-old Levon Keller survives, though his older brother David, star athlete and golden child, does not. As the fragile family mourns while trying to move on, guilt-ridden Levon finds himself lost between the memory of his brother and the constant attention his younger sister requires with a rare genetic affliction. When the beautiful and unpredictable teenager Lucy Bell moves in next door, Levon finds a trustworthy friend--one capable of providing salvation and true insight. Their friendship leads the reader on a journey that reveals family secrets and painful truths, culminating in an astonishingly suspenseful realization: when it comes to family, nothing is as it seems. Compelling and rife with raw emotion The Mourning After captures the essence of a family in crisis and recovery. It sings with the power of the human spirit.

    Still, Duke finds himself inexplicably drawn to her dark eyes and mysterious manner. She makes it clear she doesn’t return his admiration, but when a burst appendix lands Duke in the hospital, he and Cora will be forced to come together by the most unlikely intermediary: her eight-year-old brother, Jaime.So begins an epic tale—that of Ghostboy, Chameleon and the Duke of Graffiti. A tale of three normal kids who, against all odds, will become exceptional.A tale of hopes and dreams, of indelible friendship and first love.Ghostboy, Chameleon & the Duke of Graffiti is a gorgeous debut novel that will resonate with the thoughtful fans of John Green’s blockbuster The Fault in Our Stars.Foreword Reviews INDIEFAB Book of the Year Award Finalist!

    Continuing her life’s work to brighten and enrich American reading lives through the work of legendary Black authors, she now launches her Well-Read Black Girl Library Series with On Girlhood. This meticulously selected anthology features a wide range of unique voices, finally illuminating a distinctly robust sector of contemporary literature: groundbreaking short stories that explore the thin yet imperative line between Black girlhood and womanhood.Divided into four themes—Innocence, Belonging, Love, and Self-Discovery—the unforgettable young protagonists within contend with the trials of coming of age that shape who they are and what they will become. With this tradition in mind, Innocence opens with Jamaica Kincaid’s searing “Girl,” in which a mother offers fierce instructions to her impressionable daughter. This deceptively simple yet profound monologue is followed by Toni Morrison’s first and only published short story, the now-canonical “Recitatif,” about two neglected girls who come together in youth only to find themselves on opposite picket lines in adulthood.In Belonging, Toni Cade Bambara’s “The Lesson” follows rambunctious students on a field trip where they are exposed to a new world of luxury. In Love, Dana Johnson’s “Melvin in the Sixth Grade” captures the yearning of a lovesick teen smitten with the only boy who looks her way. And in Self-Discovery, Edwidge Danticat’s “Seeing Things Simply” charts the creative awakening of Princesse, a young woman with a hunger to be fully seen. These inspiring tales of world builders and rule breakers conclude with Zora Neale Hurston’s “How It Feels to Be Colored Me,” a personal essay brimming with wit and strength: “When covered by the waters, I am; and the ebb but reveals me again.”At times heartbreaking and at times hilarious, these stories boldly push past flat stereotypes and powerfully convey the beauty of Black girlhood. In bringing together an array of influential authors—past and present—whose work remains timeless, Glory Edim has created an indispensable compendium for every home library and a soul-stirring guide to coming of age.Featuring stories by Jamaica Kincaid, Toni Morrison, Dorothy West, Rita Dove, Camille Acker, Toni Cade Bambara, Amina Gautier, Alexia Arthurs, Dana Johnson, Alice Walker, Gwendolyn Brooks, Edwidge Danticat, Shay Youngblood, Paule Marshall, and Zora Neale Hurston.

    On the cusp of her fortieth birthday and with her only child almost grown, it's time to start putting herself and her marriage first. But when the butterflies in her tummy turn out to be morning sickness, Maren’s world is flipped upside down with an unplanned, high risk pregnancy—one she's ashamed to admit is unwanted.Overnight, everything changes and the ripple effect of the baby she's so unsure of is felt in every corner of her life. Her perfect life slowly disappears. Her teenage daughter looks for attention in the wrong places. Her best friend inexplicably blows up and stops speaking to her. And worse, her once doting husband pulls away when she needs him the most.Just when she's sure things couldn't possibly be worse, a shocking discovery rocks Maren's world. Faced with a devastating deception, a truth she can no longer ignore, and an impossible choice, can Maren stop her life from completely unraveling? Or is All We Never Knew too much for love to overcome?

    Ignored and lonely, Tara finds herself regressing back to childhood memories that have scarred her for life. When she was eight, her parents had left her behind with her aging grandparents and a schizophrenic uncle in Mangalore, while taking her baby brother with them to make a new life for the family in Dubai.Tara’s memories of abandonment and isolation mirror her present life of loneliness and escalating abuse at the hands of her husband. She accepts the help of kind-hearted American strangers to fight Sanjay, only to be pressured by her patriarchal family to make peace with her circumstances. Then, in a moment of truth, she discovers the importance of self-worth—a revelation that gives her the courage to break free, gently rebuild her life, and even risk being shunned by her community when she marries her childhood love, Cyrus Saldanha.Life with Cyrus is beautiful, until old fears come knocking. Ultimately, Tara must face these fears to save her relationship with Cyrus—and to confront the victim-shaming society she was raised within.Intimate and deeply moving, Purple Lotus is the story of one woman’s ascension from the dark depths of desolation toward the light of freedom.

    Some were previously published. Some are brand-spanking new. The opening story, "State Liquor," concerns a twenty-five-year-old woman and her eighteen-year-old husband trying to buy alcohol on their way to their strip mall jobs, the afternoon of their wedding. In "Fistful," a pregnant teenager gets revenge on the young man who both impregnated and beat her, before leaving town with another man. In "Habitrail," a woman returns home after the death of her father, to find her husband in communication with the television set and a god he calls Chaos, rather than her. There are over ninety stories in this collection. Repeated themes include: driving, smoking, teenagers, drinking, escape, the Midwest, masturbation, self-loathing, blood and loneliness.

    A heart warming, slow burn, late in life, friends to lovers story.Georgina owns an independent coffeehouse. Her co-owner, ex lover and sometime friend with benefits, has recently died in a car accident. Grieving, and trying to keep the business going, she finds out the half share has been willed to a complete stranger.Catherine has flitted from job to job, always searching for an important missing piece in her life. Dumped by her boyfriend, jobless, single, penniless and soon to be homeless, Catherine receives a letter which could solve all her problems.Georgina has said she would never again date a straight woman. So why is Catherine continually invading her thoughts? Catherine knows she isn’t gay. So why is she feeling something more than friendship towards Georgina? Will Georgina let her past control her future? Will Catherine acknowledge a future different to her past?Set in a coffeehouse on a busy, bustling main thoroughfare into Bristol. The Perfect Blend introduces us to the owners and characters who frequent the establishment.