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My journey from a teen struggling with self-harm, drug use, and overwhelming emotions to a DBT-Linehan Board of Certification Clinician™ and director of Creative Healing, Teen Support Centers, uniquely positions me to understand the deep emotional challenges teens face. Having navigated my own tumultuous youth and now parenting a "Fire Feeler" teen, I use my personal and professional insights to guide thousands of teens and their parents. I am passionately committed to creating environments where teens are supported while the entire family learns skills to improve and work together.
I treasure this book and recently reread it alongside my own teen! It profoundly showcases the courage required to challenge deep-seated prejudices within a community and family.
Witnessing Scout Finch's perspective on her father Atticus' stand against racial injustice amidst moral dilemmas serves as a powerful reminder of the strength needed to confront and transcend the biases we inherit, a journey that resonates with my own experiences of overcoming familial legacies.
'Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird.'
Atticus Finch gives this advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of this classic novel - a black man charged with attacking a white girl. Through the eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Lee explores the issues of race and class in the Deep South of the 1930s with compassion and humour. She also creates one of the great heroes of literature in their father, whose lone struggle for justice pricks the conscience of a town steeped…
Like the widows in The Widows’ Wine Club, I’m getting on. Unlike them, I’ve been a writer for forty years, often hunched over a keyboard, ignoring people. Amazingly, though, I managed to have a happy marriage and make some great friends. Phew! Because I’ve needed friends, especially since my husband died. Looking back, I’m interested to see that I didn’t instantly take to some of my closest buddies. Circumstances threw us together, and we got to know and like and love each other. I explore this in my book.
I LOVE books about women who won’t be told what to do.
In 1960s Mississippi, black women were "the help." Other jobs weren’t open to them. They cooked and cleaned for white people, and they raised their children, but they weren’t allowed to use the same bathroom. And they couldn’t be friends with the children they’d raised when they were adults.
Enter white would-be journalist Miss Skeeter aka Eugenia Phelan, who wants change, not least so she can find Constantine, who raised her, then disappeared. Enter Aibileen and Minny, black "helps" also wanting change, especially for their children. They recruit other "helps" who find the courage to act when it is dangerous to do so.
Boundaries are crossed, and unlikely friendships are formed. Brill book!
The #1 New York Times bestselling novel and basis for the Academy Award-winning film-a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't-nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great American Read.
Aibileen is a black maid in 1962 Jackson, Mississippi, who's always taken orders quietly, but lately she's unable to hold her bitterness back. Her friend Minny has never held her tongue but now must somehow keep secrets about her employer that leave her speechless. White socialite Skeeter just graduated college. She's full of ambition, but without a husband, she's…
I have been a voracious reader all my life. As a child, my happy place was the public library. I realized quickly that not all novels had the same effect. Most stories were enjoyable, but there were some books that told a story to make a point. These were stories with characters that I couldn’t forget, and I was challenged, encouraged, and inspired by what I read. These novels changed me for the better. I am grateful for authors who wrote stories with purpose. Now I have an opportunity to tell a story that will have an impact and make a difference in the lives of those who read it.
“Of all the kids in the seventh grade at Camillo Junior High, there was one kid that Mrs. Baker hated with heat whiter than the sun. Me.”
When I read that first line, I assumed The Wednesday Wars was going to be another shallow story with the typical conflict between a mean teacher and a student victim. But I was wrong. Completely wrong.
The Wednesday Wars will make you smile a real smile, not a teacher smile. It will make you laugh as you learn Shakespearean curses. It will make you cry when a student earns the high praise of “chrysanthemum” from a teacher who is no longer an enemy but a friend. This won’t make sense until you read the book, and it’s definitely worth reading this book.
In this Newbery Honor–winning novel, Gary D. Schmidt tells the witty and compelling story of a teenage boy who feels that fate has it in for him, during the school year 1968-69.
Seventh grader Holling Hoodhood isn't happy. He is sure his new teacher, Mrs. Baker, hates his guts. Holling's domineering father is obsessed with his business image and disregards his family. Throughout the school year, Holling strives to get a handle on the Shakespeare plays Mrs. Baker assigns him to read on his own time, and to figure out the enigmatic Mrs. Baker. As the Vietnam War turns lives…
When Elliot finds herself dead for the third time, she can't remember her past, is getting the cold shoulder from her best friend, and has no idea why she keeps repeating the same mistakes across her previous lives. Elliot just wants to move on, but first, she'll be forced to look at her past and delve into the painful memories she’d rather keep buried. She'll also have to face the person she’s killed.
As she pieces together the secrets and mistakes of her previous lives, Elliot must find a way to earn the forgiveness of the person she’s hurt most and reveal the truth about herself to her best friend and the two boys she loves…even if it means losing them all forever.
Experience the afterlife in this lyrical, paranormal debut novel that will send your heart soaring.
When Elliot finds herself dead for the third time, she knows she must have messed up, big-time. She doesn't remember how she landed in the afterlife again, but she knows this is her last chance to get things right.
Elliot just wants to move on, but first she will be forced to face her past and delve into the painful memories she'd rather keep buried. Memories of people she's hurt, people she's betrayed...and people she's killed.
As she pieces together the secrets and mistakes of…
I have been a voracious reader all my life. As a child, my happy place was the public library. I realized quickly that not all novels had the same effect. Most stories were enjoyable, but there were some books that told a story to make a point. These were stories with characters that I couldn’t forget, and I was challenged, encouraged, and inspired by what I read. These novels changed me for the better. I am grateful for authors who wrote stories with purpose. Now I have an opportunity to tell a story that will have an impact and make a difference in the lives of those who read it.
Some truths are caught and not taught. Jay is on a quest to catch escaped monkeys, but along the way, he catches something far more valuable.
With the help of his grandfather and crippled sister, Jay catches truths about perseverance, courage and sacrifice. In the process, his priorities change. As we follow Jay on his humorous and frustrating chase of a group of wily monkeys, we’ll have the chance to catch these truths as well, and have our priorities changed for the better.
From the author of the beloved classic Where the Red Fern Grows comes a timeless adventure about a boy who discovers a tree full of monkeys.
The last thing fourteen-year-old Jay Berry Lee expects to find while trekking through the Ozark Mountains of Oklahoma is a tree full of monkeys. But then Jay learns from his grandpa that the monkeys have escaped from a traveling circus, and there’s a big reward for the person who finds and returns them. His family could really use the money, so Jay sets off, determined to catch them. But by the end of the…
I've always been a person intrigued by relationships—why some last and others break up. From my perspective, distance in relationships arrives when two people have different expectations. I wanted to look at different kinds of distances in relationships—emotional, sexual, and geographical. As I was beginning to write my first stories, I read a line from my journal: explore the tension between the demands of relationships and the demand in myself to keep growing. I knew that tension was what I needed to write about. As an introvert, one of my deepest struggles has been to feel comfortable with my own boundaries in relationships, and I think that's true for most of us.
Peter Orner creates a startling intimacy with his characters. In these short, pithy vignettes, we see estranged siblings, dying spouses, missing fathers, and a marriage that is ending. Orner’s gift is to drop us right into the conflict and emotional action of his characters. Every protagonist feels like someone we know and maybe even loved. His writing is breathtaking. Spanning America of the 80s, his stories take place across the country from California to Chicago to the East Coast.
In this powerful and virtuosic collection of interlocking stories, each one "a marvel of concision and compassion" (Washington Post), a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and "master of his form" (New York Times) takes the short story to new heights.
Through forty-four compressed gems, Peter Orner, a writer who "doesn't simply bring his characters to life, he gives them souls" (NYT Book Review), chronicles people whose lives are at inflection points, gripping us with a series of defining moments.
Whether it's a first date that turns into a late-night road trip to a séance in an abandoned airplane hangar,…
I grew up on Chicago’s home front during WW2. President Roosevelt wanted everyone—adults and children—to do their part for the war effort. So we neighborhood kids formed a Victory club, where we marched around singing, “Let’s Remember Pearl Harbor,” and other patriotic songs. And though we had fun, we understood the meaning of the gold stars in the windows, and knew that terrible things were happening on the other side of the world. There are so many wonderful books set during this time period, and I can never read enough of them. These books, along with my memories, are what inspire me to write historical fiction of my own.
Even though I lived across the country from San Diego where this story takes place, and even though I was several years younger than Millie McGonigle, the picture of home front USA during WW2 is familiar in many ways. Soldiers and sailors filled the streets of Chicago, and kids scanned the sky for “enemy planes.” There was the fear of polio, the struggles with rationing, and the shortage of bubble gum.
This story is filled with humor and memorable characters. But most memorable of all is Millie, who tries to deal with the death of a grandmother and her worries about the war getting closer to home. And even though she’s obsessed with drawing in her Book of Dead Things, she comes to understand what her grandmother had told her when she said, “Whatever is lost stays alive if you remember it.”
The Newbery Award-winning author of Catherine, Called Birdy and The Midwife's Apprentice tells a heartfelt and humorous story of WWII on the homefront.
Millie McGonigle lives in sunny California, where her days are filled with beach and surf. It should be perfect--but times are tough. Hitler is attacking Europe and it looks like the United States may be going to war. Food is rationed and money is tight. And Millie's sickly little sister gets all the attention and couldn't be more of a pain if she tried. It's all Millie can do to stay calm and feel in control.
My novels range from coming-of-age to suspense. I was an award-winning crime and investigative reporter for the Columbus Dispatchfor 11 years. That background helps me with the investigative aspects of my books. I enjoy exploring the moral dilemmas often presented in real life. My characters all have morals, but I like putting them in compromising situations. It’s easy to sit back and judge others, but how far would you go to keep your own son out of jail? Would the love of your son get in the way of your morals? It’s never black or white. Most of life is spent dancing in and out of the vast gray area in the middle.
Yeah, I know, naming Jack Reacher as one of the badasses of crime fiction is the equivalent of a six-inch putt. A gimme. Child has taken a totally implausible premise—a six-foot-five former Army MP wandering around the United States and finding trouble with nothing but an ATM card in his pocket—and created one of the best characters in suspense literature. When Reacher is on the hunt, the results are never in doubt, which is why we love him. He’s the fullback coming through the line, time and time again, and no one can stop him. One reviewer of Child’s books said that Reacher is never the underdog. That’s a perfect description.
He is as close to untraceable as a person can get. A loner comfortable in his anonymity and solitude. So when a member of his old Army unit finds a way to contact him, he knows this has to be serious.
You do not mess with the Special Investigators.
In the past the elite team always watched each other's backs. Now one of them has shown up dead in the California desert and six more are missing.
Reacher's old buddies are in big trouble, and he can't let that go.
I have always been intrigued by the Roaring 20s, and specifically in how the lives of women truly began to change during this time. My grandmother loved to boast about how she had been a flapper as a young woman. Her sister-in-law was one of the first female attorneys in Detroit in the mid-20s. The era brought about opportunities and freedoms previously unknown to women. Many women suddenly had options, both in terms of careers and lifestyles. Goals of first wave feminists were beginning to be reached. The research I did for my book furthered my understanding of society at the time, particularly in America.
Curious about what life was like in the Chicago speakeasies of the 1920s—especially for Black chorus women?
Follow ambitious, yet vulnerable, Honoree Palcour, as she envelops you in her past. Like to feel like what it was like to be alive in an earlier era? You won’t be disappointed by this exciting and well-written tale!
My first career in archaeology fed my love of history and cultures, giving me insight into human motivations. As a writer, I also love a good action scene, and I began taking mixed martial arts when I was writing the Emma Fielding archaeology mysteries and then the “Fangborn” urban fantasy novels. I soon realized I wanted to write a thriller with female characters who were badass—tough and smart—women I’d want to have at my back in a fight. I found them when I wrote Exit Interview. I love a book where a woman takes charge to change things, whether it's in her community or more globally.
Cass Raines was once a cop, and now is a private investigator. She understands all too well that life is harsh and circumstances can change in an instant, especially in the criminal realms of modern-day Chicago. Smart, savvy, and tenacious, Cass is slow to trust but when she trusts you, you are her people. Dealing with dirty cops, kidnappers, and murderers, Cass walks the fine line between knowing her limits and pushing them to their utmost. Writer Tracy Clark hits every beat and then some, with a unique voice that never plays coy or saccharine, taking a realistic look at the subject of missing children and foster care.
“Exceptional…The action builds to an exciting showdown. Those who like their crime novels with a social conscience will be amply rewarded.” —Publishers Weekly, STARRED review
Former homicide cop turned private investigator Cass Raines gets the job done in this page-turning Chicago-set novel from award-winning author Tracy Clark. For mystery/suspense fans as well as fans of Laura Lippman.
Chicago in the dead of winter can be brutal, especially when you’re scouring the frigid streets for a missing girl. Fifteen-year-old Ramona Titus has run away from her foster home. Her biological mother, Leesa Evans, is a recovering addict who admits she failed…
I love noir fiction and the hard-boiled detective novels that often best exemplify the genre. Both Dashiel Hammet’s Sam Spade and Raymond Chander’s Marlowe are two men who will sacrifice everything for the truth, no matter the cost. There is a stark beauty in that. Fantasy, the genre of myth, carries the deepest, most poignant truths. These are the hard truths that can break a hero’s heart, as in Gilgamesh, or give you the bittersweet ending of The Lord of the Rings. Blending them produces some of my favorite stories, stories I love to read as the fog rolls in, listening to the music of heartbreaking jazz.
Mixing elves and eldridge powers into the gang warfare of prohibition Chicago, this book is a fast-paced wild ride into the dark and seedy lives of those who use violence to hold on to power.
The key to a good noir story is that it forces the protagonist to confront something they’d rather not know and to survive, they must find a way to live with that dark truth. This is a journey too many of us face, and Ford writes just such a brilliant journey for his protagonist, Doc.
Once I started reading this, it gripped me like cold iron until I was done.
When Danny Holman leaves the cornfields of Iowa for the bright lights of Chicago, he expects his life to change. He just can't guess how much and how fast. A violent incident on the road brings Danny the favor of a man known only as Mr. Patrise, who gives Danny a job, a home, and a new identity.
The City is a different world from the one Danny--now called Doc--knew, and literally so. Long-vanished powers have returned, and more is going on in the streets than nightlife and street warfare. Power is gathering: a power rooted in terror, madness, and…
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