She has just lost her mother Tess and brother Mikey, her marriage to Joe is coming apart at the seams and her thirty-year friendship with Karen is on the rocks.While clearing out her childhood home, Carmel discovers that her mother gave birth to a baby in an Irish Mother and Baby home when she was sixteen, a place notorious for its mass burial of babies and illegal adoptions.Carmel goes on a quest for the truth about her troubled mother’s past. Her roller-coaster journey takes her from her comfortable Manchester home to the west of Ireland and to London's theatre land. It’s a journey that leads her to ask: Can we ever escape our own family history or is our destiny in our DNA?

    . .From Sanrio, who brought you Hello Kitty, comes Gudetama, the lazy egg. Not all Sanrio characters are cheery! In Japanese, when you're lazy, you are referred to as gude gude. And that's where our new friend gets its name. Gudetama (tama from "tamago," egg in Japanese) is the lazy egg. Gudetama likes soy sauce and being left alone. Sometimes, Gudetama wonders if we are born only to suffer. And here, in Eggsistential Thoughts, are Gudetama's musings on life.

    But when a friend in need turns up at the rink, Cara drops everything to lend a helping hand. All she asks is that he pay it forward! Before long, Cara's kindness is passed all around...and might even make its way back home!Kristi Yamaguchi is an ice-skating Olympic gold medalist and world champion who knows how to lend a helping hand! As founder of the Always Dream Foundation, Kristi helps promote early childhood literacy. Through her newest picture book, Kristi inspires children of all ages to pay it forward!

    Caring for her siblings and working long hours at Swift's Jam Factory in London’s Bermondsey is exhausting. Thankfully her lifelong friendship with Dot helps to smooth over life’s rough edges.When Elsie and Dot meet Millie Swift, they are nervous to be in the presence of the bosses’ daughter. Over time, they are surprised to feel so drawn to her, but should two East End girls be socializing in such circles?When disaster strikes, it binds the women in ways they could never imagine. Long-held secrets are revealed that could change all their lives...

    What can you do to help endangered animals and make a positive change in our environment? Get counting! Counting Birds is a beautifully illustrated book that introduces kids to the idea of bird counts and bird watches. Along the way, they will learn about Frank Chapman, who used his bird knowledge and magazine Bird-Lore to found the first annual bird count.   Bird counting helps professional researchers collect data, share expertise, and spread valuable information to help all kinds of birds around the world, from condors to hawks to kestrels and more.   Counting Birds introduces kids to a whole feathered world that will fascinate and inspire them to get involved in conservation and become citizen scientists.

    She'd watch their wings flap, their beaks peck, and their eyes glint. At age six, her life was forever changed when she and a chicken she had been training to walk forwards and backwards were featured in the Path� News, and she realized that people want to see what is odd and strange in life. But while she loved birds of all varieties and kept several species around the house, it was the peacocks that came to dominate her life. Written by Amy Alznauer with devotional attention to all things odd and illustrated in radiant paint by Ping Zhu, The Strange Birds of Flannery O'Connor explores the beginnings of one author's lifelong obsession.Amy Alznauer lives in Chicago with her husband, two children, a dog, a parakeet, sometimes chicks, and a part-time fish, but, as of today, no elephants or peacocks.Ping Zhu is a freelance illustrator who has worked with clients big and small, won some awards based on the work she did for aforementioned clients, attracted new clients with shiny awards, and is hoping to maintain her livelihood in Brooklyn by repeating that cycle.

    Through decades of quiet dedication and single-minded devotion he has achieved the successes one strives for in life, both with his family and career. Close to retirement and to sitting back and enjoying the fruits of a successful career and marriage, a malicious spurious complaint at work should have no material consequences on his life, but it starts a domino effect, and before long he finds himself shockingly dismissed, divorced, without a home, and with a criminal record. This story explores a convoluted tragic journey of divorce, rich with emotion, loss, betrayal, revenge and confusion. Along the way it explores the dynamics of what makes a relationship weak and vulnerable, or strong and resolute. It’s not a miserable story, but one of resilience, hope, and true love. It is told with an immense depth of feeling, insight, humour and faith, and there are many truly surprising twists and turns as the story unfolds.

    She had the most amazing, superb, best idea ever!NO? Wait, what do you mean NO? NO again?What is she supposed to do with all these NO's?NO after NO after NO come the little girl's way, twisting and squishing her idea. But by persevering, collaborating and using a little imagination, all those NO's become the building blocks for the biggest YES ever!A Thousand NO's is a story about perseverance and innovation. It shows what amazing things can happen if we work with others and don't give up, and teaches kids not to let expectations of how things should be get in the way of what could be.

    . . Giant Owl. They used to do the most fun stuff imaginable! They’d play chase and Giant Owl would nearly catch Mouse, but not quite. Giant Owl loved Mouse so much that she used to give him as many donuts as he wanted and the most amazing presents, including his own house (a cage)! But then one day something happened, and now Mouse has found himself stuck in a very dark place . . . will his best friend help come to his rescue? This deliciously dark tale of a mouse and the "best friend" who wants to eat him will delight fans of Rob’s previous books, The Cave and The Woods.

    A dazzling series of linked portraits deftly draws us into a colorful, fantastical world full of people engaged in assorted occupations. Full-color illustrations.

    Albert reaches out the window to check the weather. But from the moment a twig lands in the palm of his hand, life is never the same.

    Anaconda,’ they call me. I don’t chase women, they chase me. I’ve made my fortune, I’ve built my empire. I play to win and live by my own set of rules. My darkest secret? There's something I’m missing. Something all my billions can’t buy. Till she came into my life. Every inch of her curvy form makes my mouth water. But she’s heard of my womanizing reputation. Now she needs a job. And I have the perfect assignment for her. $50’000 for her to be my Mrs. for two weeks. She is mine now. Now the game is on. And I play Dirty… I won’t let anybody f*ck with my plans. But to really fall for a girl. To make her completely and utterly mine. Claim her for my own. My wildest dream and my darkest nightmare all in one… Which one will it be? If I toy with my desires, will she steal my heart? Fake Bride is a steamy fake marriage romance story with no cheating, no cliffhanger and, as always, a happy ever after ending. Includes bonus content for your reading pleasure! Enjoy.

    Chocolate for breakfast, lunch and dinner!When he runs out of his favorite food he just cries and cries.What will Chocolate Bear do? Where will he find more chocolate?Will he ever learn to eat other foods?This beginner reader's eBook will inspire your children to try new foods,And to solve basic problems.Your children will enjoy full-color illustrations ofChocolate Bear,his mother and their neighborhood. Chocolate Bear is a delightfully illustrated children's book for you and your children to read Together. With simple text, this story is suitable as a read aloud book for preschoolers or a self-Read book for beginner readers.

    Or is he? They’re all keeping secrets but as the big birthday looms, the beans are about to be spilt, and one of them is going to need her friends more than ever…

        Starting with a father whose son has been asking questions about global dangers, A Is for Asteroids, Z Is for Zombies takes us inside our worst fears, laughing at some and taking others seriously. With macabre verse and fantastically gory illustrations, it provides gallows humor for our doom-haunted times.