It Is What It Is: A So For Real Novel

It Is What It Is: A So For Real Novel PDF Author: Nikki Carter
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp.
ISBN: 075828523X
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
Gia's got to face the good, the bad, and the new. . . Gia Stokes is psyched for the start of her junior year at Longfellow High. She's co-captain of the Hi-Steppers dance squad, she's back on good terms with her cousin Hope, and her best friend Ricky has achieved hottie status as the school's new first-string quarterback. Now all the girls are after him, including Valerie--Gia's co-captain--and Hope. They both want Gia's help to score a date with Ricky, but how is Gia supposed to choose between them? If that wasn't enough, she also has to deal with a new dad and an annoying fourteen-year-old stepsister. It's going to take every ounce of faith Gia has to flip this script and make her junior year one to remember. "Gia Stokes might be a Hi-Stepper, but this teen role model has both feet on the ground as she meets life's challenges with style and grace." --Melody Carlson, author of the Diary of a Teenage Girl series

It Is What It Is: A So For Real Novel

It Is What It Is: A So For Real Novel PDF Author: Nikki Carter
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp.
ISBN: 075828523X
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
Gia's got to face the good, the bad, and the new. . . Gia Stokes is psyched for the start of her junior year at Longfellow High. She's co-captain of the Hi-Steppers dance squad, she's back on good terms with her cousin Hope, and her best friend Ricky has achieved hottie status as the school's new first-string quarterback. Now all the girls are after him, including Valerie--Gia's co-captain--and Hope. They both want Gia's help to score a date with Ricky, but how is Gia supposed to choose between them? If that wasn't enough, she also has to deal with a new dad and an annoying fourteen-year-old stepsister. It's going to take every ounce of faith Gia has to flip this script and make her junior year one to remember. "Gia Stokes might be a Hi-Stepper, but this teen role model has both feet on the ground as she meets life's challenges with style and grace." --Melody Carlson, author of the Diary of a Teenage Girl series

It's All Good: A So For Real Novel

It's All Good: A So For Real Novel PDF Author: Nikki Carter
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp.
ISBN: 0758281668
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 211

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Book Description
Keeping it real isn't always easy. . . Gia Stokes can't wait for the debutante ball that will help celebrate the end of her junior year. She's been crushing hard on her best friend Ricky?and is hoping he'll ask her to the dance. But her friend Kevin has been looking hot too?and Gia isn't the only one at Longfellow High who's noticed. As if Gia's boy trouble wasn't enough, she's also got to deal with Valerie, who's still bitter about losing the Homecoming Queen crown and has convinced the Hi-Steppers dance squad that it's time for revenge. And then there's Sascha Cohen, who's about to get caught in a scandal that will make Gia and her friends think twice before they let their high school crushes turn into something more. . . "Full of fun-loving, unforgettable characters that readers will love. . ." --ReShonda Tate Billingsley, author of The Good Girlz series on Step to This

Cool Like That: A So For Real Novel

Cool Like That: A So For Real Novel PDF Author: Nikki Carter
Publisher: Dafina Young Adult
ISBN: 075825993X
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Let the fireworks begin. . . Now that she's been accepted into a summer enrichment program in New York City, Gia knows she's going to have the flyest summer ever. Especially since her mom and her annoying stepsister won't be around. And best of all? Her best friend, Ricky, is joining her so they're going to spend the entire summer together. Gia hopes Ricky's finally going to make a move on her, but it seems like Ricky's bent on playing it safe--too safe, as far as Gia's concerned. So when Rashad, a cutie from the summer program, starts to get his flirt on with Gia, she's got a new crush--and Ricky's so not cool with that. "Gia makes me want to holler out loud--she knows how to think for herself and she definitely has enough drama to fill a thousand pages!" --Michelle Stimpson, Essence© bestselling author on the So For Real series "Nikki Carter is a fresh, new voice." ? ReShonda Tate Billingsley, Essence? bestselling author

What Makes This Book So Great

What Makes This Book So Great PDF Author: Jo Walton
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1466844094
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 488

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Book Description
As any reader of Jo Walton's Among Others might guess, Walton is both an inveterate reader of SF and fantasy, and a chronic re-reader of books. In 2008, then-new science-fiction mega-site Tor.com asked Walton to blog regularly about her re-reading—about all kinds of older fantasy and SF, ranging from acknowledged classics, to guilty pleasures, to forgotten oddities and gems. These posts have consistently been among the most popular features of Tor.com. Now this volumes presents a selection of the best of them, ranging from short essays to long reassessments of some of the field's most ambitious series. Among Walton's many subjects here are the Zones of Thought novels of Vernor Vinge; the question of what genre readers mean by "mainstream"; the underappreciated SF adventures of C. J. Cherryh; the field's many approaches to time travel; the masterful science fiction of Samuel R. Delany; Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children; the early Hainish novels of Ursula K. Le Guin; and a Robert A. Heinlein novel you have most certainly never read. Over 130 essays in all, What Makes This Book So Great is an immensely readable, engaging collection of provocative, opinionated thoughts about past and present-day fantasy and science fiction, from one of our best writers. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

I Know This Much Is True

I Know This Much Is True PDF Author: Wally Lamb
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780060391621
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 884

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Book Description
With his stunning debut novel, She's Come Undone, Wally Lamb won the adulation of critics and readers with his mesmerizing tale of one woman's painful yet triumphant journey of self-discovery. Now, this brilliantly talented writer returns with I Know This Much Is True, a heartbreaking and poignant multigenerational saga of the reproductive bonds of destruction and the powerful force of forgiveness. A masterpiece that breathtakingly tells a story of alienation and connection, power and abuse, devastation and renewal--this novel is a contemporary retelling of an ancient Hindu myth. A proud king must confront his demons to achieve salvation. Change yourself, the myth instructs, and you will inhabit a renovated world. When you're the same brother of a schizophrenic identical twin, the tricky thing about saving yourself is the blood it leaves on your bands--the little inconvenience of the look-alike corpse at your feet. And if you're into both survival of the fittest and being your brother's keeper--if you've promised your dying mother--then say so long to sleep and hello to the middle of the night. Grab a book or a beer. Get used to Letterman's gap-toothed smile of the absurd, or the view of the bedroom ceiling, or the influence of random selection. Take it from a godless insomniac. Take it from the uncrazy twin--the guy who beat the biochemical rap. Dominick Birdsey's entire life has been compromised and constricted by anger and fear, by the paranoid schizophrenic twin brother he both deeply loves and resents, and by the past they shared with their adoptive father, Ray, a spit-and-polish ex-Navy man (the five-foot-six-inch sleeping giant who snoozed upstairs weekdays in the spare room and built submarines at night), and their long-suffering mother, Concettina, a timid woman with a harelip that made her shy and self-conscious: She holds a loose fist to her face to cover her defective mouth--her perpetual apology to the world for a birth defect over which she'd had no control. Born in the waning moments of 1949 and the opening minutes of 1950, the twins are physical mirror images who grow into separate yet connected entities: the seemingly strong and protective yet fearful Dominick, his mother's watchful "monkey"; and the seemingly weak and sweet yet noble Thomas, his mother's gentle "bunny." From childhood, Dominick fights for both separation and wholeness--and ultimately self-protection--in a house of fear dominated by Ray, a bully who abuses his power over these stepsons whose biological father is a mystery. I was still afraid of his anger but saw how he punished weakness--pounced on it. Out of self-preservation I hid my fear, Dominick confesses. As for Thomas, he just never knew how to play defense. He just didn't get it. But Dominick's talent for survival comes at an enormous cost, including the breakup of his marriage to the warm, beautiful Dessa, whom he still loves. And it will be put to the ultimate test when Thomas, a Bible-spouting zealot, commits an unthinkable act that threatens the tenuous balance of both his and Dominick's lives. To save himself, Dominick must confront not only the pain of his past but the dark secrets he has locked deep within himself, and the sins of his ancestors--a quest that will lead him beyond the confines of his blue-collar New England town to the volcanic foothills of Sicily 's Mount Etna, where his ambitious and vengefully proud grandfather and a namesake Domenico Tempesta, the sostegno del famiglia, was born. Each of the stories Ma told us about Papa reinforced the message that he was the boss, that he ruled the roost, that what he said went. Searching for answers, Dominick turns to the whispers of the dead, to the pages of his grandfather's handwritten memoir, The History of Domenico Onofrio Tempesta, a Great Man from Humble Beginnings. Rendered with touches of magic realism, Domenico's fablelike tale--in which monkeys enchant and religious statues weep--becomes the old man's confession--an unwitting legacy of contrition that reveals the truth's of Domenico's life, Dominick learns that power, wrongly used, defeats the oppressor as well as the oppressed, and now, picking through the humble shards of his deconstructed life, he will search for the courage and love to forgive, to expiate his and his ancestors' transgressions, and finally to rebuild himself beyond the haunted shadow of his twin. Set against the vivid panoply of twentieth-century America and filled with richly drawn, memorable characters, this deeply moving and thoroughly satisfying novel brings to light humanity's deepest needs and fears, our aloneness, our desire for love and acceptance, our struggle to survive at all costs. Joyous, mystical, and exquisitely written, I Know This Much Is True is an extraordinary reading experience that will leave no reader untouched.

This Is How It Always Is

This Is How It Always Is PDF Author: Laurie Frankel
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1250088550
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
"This is Claude. He's five years old, the youngest of five brothers. He also loves peanut butter sandwiches. He also loves wearing a dress, and dreams of being a princess.When he grows up, Claude says, he wants to be a girl. Rosie and Penn want Claude to be whoever Claude wants to be. They're just not sure they're ready to share that with the world. Soon the entire family is keeping Claude's secret. Until one day it explodes."--

Step To This: A So For Real Novel

Step To This: A So For Real Novel PDF Author: Nikki Carter
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp.
ISBN: 0758281706
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
Fifteen-year-old Gia Stokes knows exactly what she needs to make her life fantabulous: • Get her mother Gwendolyn to let her relax her hair • Find a boy to ask her out • Get on the Hi-Steppers dance squad Gia doesn't have the hair or the clothes, but she's got the moves and the attitude to make her sophomore year at Longfellow High unforgettable. But not everyone agrees, so Gia decides it's time for a makeover. With her stylish new look, she scores a date with hottie football player, Romeo, snags a spot on the Hi-Steppers dance squad, and makes a ton of new friends. Gia's on top of the world?until things go horribly wrong. Now Gia feels like all she has left is her mom and her faith. That's not going to stop Gia, she's just got to convince the Hi-Steppers and everyone else at school, to follow her lead and step to her beat. "Step to This is hot, it's new, it's now. . .with characters that leap from the pages, it's absolutely a must-read." --Monica McKayhan, Essence bestselling author of Indigo Summer "Filled with smart and witty characters, Step to This is a fun, fast-paced read teens will love." --Ni-Ni Simone, author of A Girl Like Me "Nikki Carter steps up and delivers a home run with her debut novel, Step to This. It's a real winner." --Chandra Sparks Taylor, author of Spin It Like That and The Pledge "Nikki Carter is a fresh, new voice in teen fiction! Step to This has it all--drama, humor, and a lesson that everyone can learn from. Full of fun-loving, unforgettable characters that readers will love, Nikki has written a page-turner that will leave the reader wanting more!" --ReShonda Tate Billingsley, author of The Good Girlz series "Gia Stokes might be a Hi-Stepper, but this teen role model has both feet on the ground as she meets life's challenges with style and grace. Kudos to Nikki Carter for a great start in this fun and relevant teen series!" --Melody Carlson, author of The Carter House Girls, Diary of a Teenage Girl, TrueColors and The Secret Life of Samantha McGregor series "Step to This is a wonderful, witty tale that is full of laugh-out-loud moments and great lessons." --Victoria Christopher Murray, National bestselling author of The Divine Divas series "Fun, honest, and so for real . . . I loved Gia and cheered for her as she struggled to find where she fits with friends, family, and faith. Debut author Nikki Carter is now on my must-read list!" --Shelley Adina, author of the All About Us series "Step to This has alluring characters, wonderful scenes, and a fascinating premise. Nikki Carter has a real talent for writing stories that deal with real issues, but are gripping to read by teens and adults alike." --Jacquelin Thomas, author of The Divine Series

Tears of a Tiger

Tears of a Tiger PDF Author: Sharon M. Draper
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1442489138
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 25

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Book Description
The death of high school basketball star Rob Washington in an automobile accident affects the lives of his close friend Andy, who was driving the car, and many others in the school.

Life Is Short And So Is This Book

Life Is Short And So Is This Book PDF Author: Peter Atkins
Publisher: peter atkins
ISBN:
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 38

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Book Description
Life is short. You can, if you work hard and are lucky, get more of almost anything, but you can't get more time. Time only goes one way. The average American has a lifespan of less than 30,000 days. So how you choose to live matters. That's the topic of this book. I don't pretend to have all the answers. I'm still learning every day, and many of the good ideas here I've picked up from other people either directly or by reading. But this is what's worked for me. Like life, this book is short. Many books I read could communicate their ideas in fewer pages. So I've tried to be brief in line with the wise person who noted: "If I'd had more time I would have written a shorter letter". I don't think brevity implies lack of content. The concepts here have improved the quality of my life, and I hope they're useful to you as well. Using these concepts, I have created a life I love. My job doesn't feel like work. I love and respect the people with whom I spend time. And I'm also passionate about my life outside work. I've learned how to create a balance that makes me happy between work and other interests, including my family, friends and exercise. Sadly I think that's rare. And yet, while I know I'm lucky, most people can work towards those goals in their own lives. My interest in making the most of my life began when I was just starting college, but when I was in my mid-thirties a boss I admired died of cancer. He was young. He had a great wife; he had three young children; he had a fantastic career -- he had everything in life. He just didn't have enough time. So, while I'd often thought about how to get the most out of life, the death of someone so young and vital increased my sense of urgency to act on it. One of the things I've always wanted to do was to work for myself. As a result, I left an exciting job at Microsoft in 2001 amidst the Internet bust to found the investing firm I now run. It was hard to do, both financially and emotionally. When I left Microsoft, many people - friends, family, and even some of the press - thought I was deluding myself to start a fund focused on Internet-related companies during a market crash. A press quote from the time said: "Call him a little crazy. Call him a little nuts." I'd never seen that type of coverage before. And, in a sense, the press was right; the business wasn't easy to start. Fortunately, from a vantage point of ten years down the road, it's worked out quite well. A key part of my job is reading and thinking about a broad variety of topics. So writing this book was relatively easy. It's even easier to read. But, like many things in life, actually executing each day on these concepts is extremely difficult. With thanks to Thomas Edison, life is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. Even so, I hope you have fun perspiring. Peter Atkins Seattle, WA December, 2010

Avatars, Book One: So This Is How It Ends

Avatars, Book One: So This Is How It Ends PDF Author: Tui T. Sutherland
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0060750243
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 368

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Book Description
In this enthralling fantasy debut, five teenagers experience an Earth that's familiar but dramatically different, with voices that hover at the edges of consciousness, urgently calling.