Briana Bloomfield, the talent Jake Lowenstein, the genius "Mongo," the muscle Jamal Wilson, the fifth grader --and--Riley Mack, the fearless leaderTogether, these five are the Known Troublemakers, stirring up trouble in the name of justice. Wherever a wrong needs righting or an innocent kid needs protecting, Riley and his friends will be there, ready to use their problem-causing expertise for the greater good.Only this time, injustice strikes a little too close to home. School's out for the summer, and somebody's polluting the gang's favorite swimming hole. And if that wasn't enough to ruin the vacation, one of the Troublemakers is in serious trouble, and all of Riley's efforts to help are only making things worse. With ten thousand dollars and the fate of his friends and family on the line, Riley will have to think fast if he hopes to pull off his most daring caper yet!

Product DescriptionWhen Ashley Hunter inherits the Inn where her father mysteriously vanished years ago, she jumps at the chance to finally uncover the truth about his disappearance. But soon after taking ownership of the decrepit building, Ashley realizes she’s in for far more than she bargained. Not only has she inherited answers to many sought-after questions, she’s also inherited spirits, demons and even fallen angels! Then Cristian arrives, a gorgeous man who insists he merely needs a room to rent. She believes him, until one by one her ghosts start disappearing...As a fallen angel destined for a life of servitude, Cristian Lucius is relegated to protecting earth from unwanted spirits. But he can’t accomplish this daunting task alone. He requires assistance from the very woman who frustrates him as much as she intrigues him. Cristian is determined to ignore his intense attraction for Ashley, and focus on his mission. If they don’t work together, they won’t have a chance in hell of defeating the demon threatening their lives. The problem is getting Ashley to trust him. No easy task, considering Cristian is the very man responsible for her father’s disappearance.Book 2 in the Hunter Series:The Demon Hunter

A boy and his grandpa hope to strike oil in drought-ridden Oklahoma It's hot in Oklahoma. There's no wind, the wells are dry, and the ground is dead. Orvie's family is doing everything they can to keep their farm going. If they miss a payment on the mortgage, the bank will take their home away, and they'll have nowhere else to go. Farming is tough, honest work, and it's no way to get rich. For years, Orvie's grandfather has sworn that there's oil under their land, and as soon as it starts bubbling up, they'll have more money than they know what to do with. But when the oil boom sweeps across Oklahoma, Orvie will find there are some problems that money can't solve. This rich portrait of life during the Oklahoma oil boom provides a lovingly detailed look at a forgotten time in history.

When two teenagers steal a purse from a stroller, it results in an infant’s death. Unaware of the enormity of their crime, Zipp and Andreas are intent on committing another. They follow an elderly woman home, and Andreas enters her house with his switchblade. In the dark, Zipp waits for his friend to come out.Inspector Konrad Sejer and his colleague Jacob Skarre see no connection between the infant’s death and the reported disappearance of a local delinquent. And so while the confusion outside mounts, the heart-stopping truth unfolds inside the old woman’s home.Unflappable as ever, Sejer digs below the surface of small- town tranquility in an effort to understand how and why violence destroys everyday lives.From Publishers WeeklySkillful characterization and revealing detail lift Fossum's third mystery to be published in the U.S. featuring thoughtful, intelligent Insp. Konrad Sejer (after 2005's He Who Fears the Wolf). Handsome Andreas Winther, a self-absorbed, dangerously restless 18-year-old, manages to draw both sympathy and disgust from the reader. He roams the streets of an unnamed provincial Norwegian town in the evenings, accompanied by his socially inept friend, Sivert "Zipp" Skorpe, and fueled by the enormity of a secret he keeps. One evening, after mugging a young mother, Andreas decides to break into an old woman's house to rob her. His intended victim, Irma Funder, has a complicated health situation and a more complicated psyche. In defending herself, Irma pushes Andreas down the cellar stairs, where he lands unnaturally twisted, unable to move but alive. What develops between the immobile boy and the reclusive woman is a bizarre, excruciating, curiously tender relationship that serves as a pathetic and poignant balance to the hunt for Andreas conducted by Sejer and his police colleague, Jacob Skarre. (July) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistFossum's Konrad Sejer procedurals, set in Oslo, are among the many Scandinavian mysteries that have followed Henning Mankell's Kurt Wallander series to the U.S. Her first novel to appear here, Don't Look Back (2004), was very much in the world-weary Wallander mold, with Sejer investigating a 15-year-old girl's murder and finding multiple layers of ambiguity. Although Sejer is present again this time, the story is much less like a contemporary European procedural and more like a Ruth Rendell psychological thriller. As Sejer and his colleague Jacob Skarre investigate a mugging and the disappearance of a delinquent, the reader sees what the coppers don't, following the tragic events in the life of the delinquent and the very disturbed elderly woman he encounters. At times this story is almost unendurably painful, as our sense of the inevitable clashes with our uncertainty about the outcome. All of the characters are victims of a kind, and all are trapped in one way or another. We feel equally trapped, by our proximity to so many lives gone wrong, and by our inability to close the book. Bill OttCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

On the day she turned seventy-seven, internationally acclaimed mystery writer P. D. James embarked on an endeavor unlike any other in her distinguished career: she decided to write a personal memoir in the form of a diary. Over the course of a year she set down not only the events and impressions of her extraordinarily active life, but also the memories, joys, discoveries, and crises of a lifetime. This enchantingly original volume is the result.Time to Be in Earnest offers an intimate portrait of one of most accomplished women of our time. Here are vivid, revealing accounts of her school days in Cambridge in the 1920s and '30s, her happy marriage and the tragedy of her husband's mental illness, and the thrill of publishing her first novel, Cover Her Face, in 1962. As she recounts the decades of her exceptional life, James holds forth with wit and candor on such diverse subjects as the evolution of the detective novel, her deep love of the English countryside, her views of author tours and television adaptations, and her life-long obsession with Jane Austen. Wise and frank, engaging and graceful, this "fragment of autobiography" will delight and surprise P. D. James's admirers the world over.Amazon.com Review"At seventy-seven it is time to be in earnest," wrote Samuel Johnson, and bestselling crime writer P.D. James took this maxim as a challenge, setting out to record "one year that otherwise might be lost." The result is a fascinating and reflective account, part diary and part memoir, of one very full year of Baroness James's life, interspersed with her memories and intelligent analysis of "what it was like to be born two years after the end of the First World War and to live for seventy-eight years in this tumultuous century." P.D. James grew up in Cambridge, England, between the wars and worked in the home office of the forensic and criminal justice departments, which sparked her interest in that area, though she did not become a published novelist until 1962 with Cover Her Face. She began to write full-time after her "retirement" in 1979, and along the way became a governor of the BBC before taking a seat in the House of Lords in 1991. Time to Be in Earnest is a lucid and penetrative work by one of the most influential figures currently involved with the arts in Britain. James reveals her vast scope for enjoyment, interest, and simply getting on with life (her husband, Connor White, died at the age of 44 in 1964 after years of mental illness), whether it be spending time with her children and grandchildren, musing on the hideous British architectural mistakes of the 1960s, or giving her view of the controversies continually surrounding the running of the BBC. At an age when many people would be considering slowing down, James seems constantly on the move, recording her day-to-day existence and her past with an alert and judicious eye. "I am sustained by the magnificent irrationality of faith," she states. "I inhabit a different body, but I can reach back over nearly 70 years and recognise her as myself. Then I walked in hope--and I do so still." --Catherine Taylor, Amazon.co.ukFrom Publishers WeeklyJames's fans will eagerly devour every word of this insightful and witty account of a year in the life of the master mystery author In the diary she began on her 77th birthday, in August 1997, James comfortably segues from daily activities into reminiscences about her childhood, early forays into writing and her career as a civil servant in Britain. She also weighs in on a variety of subjects, including the movie Titanic (the "usual Hollywood anti-British bias" irritated her), the publishing industry (promising novels are "promoted, packaged, and sold like a new perfume") and London's Millennial Dome, which inspired her "Dome Pome" (which begins, "O Dome Gigantic, Dome immense/ Built in defiance of common sense"). James reveals herself to be proper, dignified and reserved, but she doesn't reveal much more: readers expecting a traditional diary or spilled secrets are bound to be dissatisfied, though they can't say they weren't warned; in her prologue, James announces that she'll neither rehash painful memories nor record "the events of every day." The painful memories no doubt relate to her late husband's long battle with mental illness, which she mentions often but never fully explores. It's just as well she sticks to the latter promise, for while many of her activities will interest a wide range of readers, there are times when her musings do little to contradict her claim that she is simply "an elderly grandmother who writes traditional English detective fiction." 16 pages of photos not seen by PW. 50,000 first printing. (Apr.) Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Anyone can escape danger. No one can escape the truth.When a ship full of Sith warriors arrived in Galactic Alliance space, the fight to destroy it accidentally uncovered a hidden menace: a long-hidden group of clones, secretly created as insidious weapons capable of wielding the Force and heedless of the differences between light side and dark side. Now the clones have escaped--and evidence suggests that they are flawed by genetic disease and violent madness.Jedi Knight Jaden Korr pursues the clones, hoping to heal them but prepared to destroy them. What he doesn't know is that Sith agents are hot on his heels, determined not only to recover the clones for their Master but to capture Jaden for their own dark-side purposes. In a life-or-death battle, Jaden will confront a shocking reality that will rock him to his core and bring him face-to-face with the question of what makes a man . . . and a Jedi.Features a bonus section following the novel...

Using unprecedented, dramatically compelling sleuthing techniques, legendary statistician and baseball writer Bill James applies his analytical acumen to crack an unsolved century-old mystery surrounding one of the deadliest serial killers in American history.Between 1898 and 1912, families across the country were bludgeoned in their sleep with the blunt side of an axe. Jewelry and valuables were left in plain sight, bodies were piled together, faces covered with cloth. Some of these cases, like the infamous Villasca, Iowa, murders, received national attention. But few people believed the crimes were related. And fewer still would realize that all of these families lived within walking distance to a train station. When celebrated baseball statistician and true crime expert Bill James first learned about these horrors, he began to investigate others that might fit the same pattern. Applying the same know-how he brings to his legendary baseball analysis, he empirically...

From Publishers WeeklyCanadian writer Sawyer brings his Neanderthal Parallax trilogy to a close, leaving some loose ends that beg for a follow-up further exploring the interaction of two parallel worlds: the overcrowded and polluted one we're used to and another inhabited by highly intelligent and civilized Neanderthals. In the earlier books (Hominids and Humans), physicist Ponter Boddit got translated from the Neanderthal world to ours, where he fell in love with geneticist Mary Vaughn. The couple joined with people of good will from both worlds to keep the link open. Now, though, it's time to consider the implications of such a continuing connection. If people have trouble getting along because of such distinctions as sex and race, how will they be able to co-exist with members of another species? Some individuals see anyone different as a rival, a threat that must be destroyed. Others coldly calculate how to seize new territory for "humanity." Sawyer's characters are less interesting for who they are than for what they are-or what they represent. Still, his picture of the unspoiled Neanderthal world is charming, and he raises some provocative questions. If, for example, only Earth-humans have brains capable of religious belief, should Ponter and Mary genetically design their child with that ability or not? It all amounts to some of the most outrageous, stimulating speculation since Robert A. Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land questioned our tired, timid conventions.Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. From BooklistIn the conclusion of the Neanderthal Parallax trilogy (_Hominids_, 2002, and Humans [BKL Ja 1 & 15 03] precede it), scientists and lovers Mary Vaughan, who is human, and Ponter Boddit, who is Neanderthal, embark on the harrowing adventure of conceiving a child together. To overcome the genetic barbed wire of mismatched chromosomes, they must use banned technology obtainable only from a Neanderthal scientist living in the northern wilderness, alone but not isolated, for Neanderthals prefer a nonprivate society in which injured persons are quickly rescued, theft is unknown, and personal violence is contained, thanks to permanently implanted personal monitors--a society whose benefits Sawyer persuasively describes. The Neanderthals' electronic surveillance is compatible with their basic peacefulness, however, and can't begin to cope with human craftiness or the malevolent racism of one of Mary's colleagues, who considers Ponter's world as a plum ripe for picking. If his ambitions constitute one alarming threat to a society, the imminent collapse of Earth's magnetic field constitutes another, for it is feared that this will wreak havoc with human consciousness. In an excellent closing twist, a New Year's celebration is disrupted in a very alarming, uniquely human manner as a few Neanderthals watch dumbfounded. A fine combination of love story, social commentary, and ecothriller closes a terrific series with a bang. Roberta JohnsonCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Cassia Pappas has found herself in a nearly impossible situation. She wants to spend her time immersed in her new job at a Galveston Island floral shop, arranging blooms and brightening occasions with her lovely creations. But her huge Greek family—especially her father—has other ideas. They've all relocated to Galveston to open up a new family restaurant location on the Strand— directly across the street from the Rossis' popular pizza place—and they want Cassia's full participation. To make matters worse, as Cassia is trying to develop a strong professional relationship with Galveston's premier wedding coordinator, Bella Neeley, her own father is intent on stealing all of the Rossi family's faithful customers. Not exactly the best way to get into Bella's good graces!Still, at least Alex, that hot delivery guy from the nursery, is always hanging around the flower shop . . .Fan favorite Janice Thompson gives readers one more romp with...

The secret is out—DROON is the series that kids, parents, and teachers are talking about! Keeah, a junior wizard, has always dreamed of the day she would receive her Wizardbook. So when her mother presents her first one, Keeah is overjoyed. But what she doesn't realize is how very powerful and dangerous a Wizardbook can be. If she isn't careful, she might accidentally destroy the entire kingdom of Droon! Keeah will need the help of her friends, Eric, Julie, and Neal, along with Max the Spider Troll, to keep her on the right path... For the first time ever readers get to hear Keeah's point of  view as she tells readers about the exciting adventures and wondrous magic of Droon!

This is why I have had to come back now, traveling these dusty old back roads one more time. For I mean to tell my story, and I mean to tell the truth. I am a believer in the Word, and I am not going to flinch from telling it, not even the terrible things… Florida Grace Shepherd, eleventh child of the itinerant, snake-handling Reverend Virgil Shepherd, grew up traveling across the Appalachian South. In her heart, she raged against the constant hardships that her parents insisted were part of the Lord?™s plan. As she got older, she learned of her father?™s “backsliding” with other women, and watched as it drove her mother to an early grave. Returning to Scrabble Creek, where her happiest memories took place, Grace recounts the harrowing journey of her life with the Lord, from her travels with her father to the day she finally broke free of him only to marry another preacher much older than she, as well as her own stumbles along the rocky and...

21st Century Cologne On the day of her sixteenth birthday Nela receives her Binding – a tattoo that’ll punish even the thought of magic with burning pain. In a world where the Brotherhood still burns witches at the stake, Nela has learned to fear her magical powers. But her powers are growing and refuse to be ignored. When Nela meets Darko, he shows her a hidden world of magic she can’t resist. Darko hates the Brotherhood with blind fervor for destroying his life. Except for revenge, there’s only one thing that keeps him going: the wish to bring his dead sister back to life. The only way to gain the necessary power is by summoning a demon with the help of a Necromancer and absorbing its demonic power. When his Master tells Darko that Nela is what they need for the ritual, Darko doesn’t hesitate to gain her trust. A trust he’ll have to betray. As Nela meets witches in the underground bars of Cologne and celebrates Walpurgisnight with magical folk from all over the world, she realizes that she doesn’t want to bow to the Brotherhood’s rules anymore. She wants to be free to live as a witch. Defying the Brotherhood could mean death by fire, but as Nela is pulled deeper into Darko’s world, she realizes that his darkness might be the true danger.   

The mother of ‘Anna’ in this novel dies in childbirth and she brought up by her father and a governess, in a remote Pyrenean village. When she is thirteen, her father shoots himself and she Is adopted by a rich, beautiful and ruthless aunt who stows her in a boarding school. She forms friendships at the school but her freedom is abruptly curtailed when the aunt forces her into a loveless marriage: she comes to detest her husband and bourgeois family but cannot break away and finds herself marooned with him in Burma, where the story climaxes.

An engineer battles a small town to see his sister released from prisonIt takes Reno three days to get from Peru to the Gulf Coast, and when he gets to Waynesport he has only one stop to make: the city jail, where his sister is being held on a murder rap. The way Vickie tells it, she saw her husband having a drink with another woman, they quarreled, and she went to the bathroom. When she came out, he was shot through the back of the skull. The police believe every word of her story—except the part about who pulled the trigger.Her husband was in Waynesport looking for a crook named Rupert Conway, whom the local police do not seem towant found. To save his sister's neck, Reno must wade through corruption as fetid as the swamps that surround this hellish southern town, where the alligators aren't the only ones who are eager to kill.

Rue Shaw has everything--a much loved child, a solid marriage, and a job she loves. Saying Grace takes place in Rue's mid-life, when her daughter is leaving home, her parents are failing, her husband is restless and the school she has built is being buffeted by changes in society that affect us all. Funny, rich in detail and finally stunning, this novel presents a portrait of a tight-knit community in jeopardy, and of a charming woman whose most human failing is that she wants things to stay the same. Saying Grace is about the fragility of human happiness and the strength of convictions, about keeping faith as a couple whether it keeps one safe or not. Beth Gutcheon has a gift for creating a world in microcosm and capturing the grace in the rhythms of everyday life.

Where there is light, there must always be shadow? The fourth volume in Janny Wurts?s spectacular epic fantasy, now re-released with a striking new cover design along with the rest of the series. The curse that hangs over the Master of Shadow, Arithon, and Lord of Light, Lysaer, is drawing the two half-brothers ever closer towards direct conflict. For the Natural Balance to be maintained, the two must never fight. If they do, one is sure to perish and the Mistwraith will regain its evil power over their world. Even now, Lysaer ? convinced of his own godhead and aided by the treacherous Koriani Sisterhood ? is tracking Arithon the Masterbard through the snows and wastes of the winter-locked mountains and the Barrens of Daon Ramon. Arithon is tortured by the knowledge that for the sake of future generations he must not be killed, no matter the cost of others? lives now. Fighting valiantly to prevent unnecessary suffering, he strikes out on his own; but he is injured and failing...

Are you average? Normal? Forgettable? If so, the League of Unexceptional Children is for you! This first book in a hilarious new adventure series is for anyone who's struggled to be noticed in a sea of above-average overachievers.What is the League of Unexceptional Children? I'm glad you asked. You didn't ask? Well, you would have eventually and I hate to waste time. The League of Unexceptional Children is a covert network that uses the nation's most average, normal, and utterly unexceptional children as spies. Why the average kids? Why not the brainiacs? Or the beauty queens? Or the jocks? It's simple: People remember them. But not the unexceptionals. They are the forgotten ones. Until now!

This short story by Suzanne Selfors is a companion to her novel A Semi-Charming Kind of Life. At Ever After High, Dexter Charming enjoys spending time with his intelligent, bookish, well-mannered pet, Mr. Cottonhorn. When a spell goes awry, and Dexter and Raven are faced with a bunch of unruly baby jackalopes, can Mr. Cottonhorn help to save the day? Read this original short story about Dexter and his pet jackalope, Mr. Cottonhorn.

On the busiest shopping day of the year, a group of idealistic college students believe they're about to carry out an elaborate media stunt at the largest mall in America. They think the equipment in their backpacks will disrupt stores' computer systems, causing delays and chaos, disrupting capitalism, if only for a moment. What they don't realize is that instead of jamming devices, their backpacks contain explosives. And they're about to become unwitting suicide bombers. FBI profiler Maggie O'Dell must put her own political troubles aside to work with Nick Morrelli and figure out who's behind this terrorist plot—a massacre that's all the more frightening when a tip reveals that Maggie's brother is one of the doomed protestors. **From Publishers Weekly Starred Review. Bestseller Kava's superb Maggie O'Dell thriller (after Exposed) features a particularly memorable villain, the Project Manager (aka Robert Asante), the third party behind 1995's horrifying Oklahoma City bombing, along with real-life terrorists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols. Now Asante has directed an attack on Minnesota's Mall of America during Black Friday, the big retailing day after Thanksgiving, that kills 32 people, including two students who were duped into carrying devices that they believed would just create an electronic blackout. FBI profiler O'Dell, still recovering from the death of her boss, must work with her new superior, hypercritical Raymond Kunze, as well as her ex-boyfriend, security consultant Nick Morrelli, to prevent a second major terrorist outrage Asante has planned to follow shortly after the first. Kava peppers the breathless action with enough intel to make the premise scarily real. (Oct.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Review "Move over Patricia Cornwell, Kathy Reichs and Karin Slaughter" - Guardian "Not for the faint of heart." - Peter Robinson "Kava's writing is reminiscent of Patricia Cornwell in her prime" - Mystery Ink"

Everyone knew Alicia Harrison’s marriage to Ilya Stern wouldn’t last. They’d grown up on a remote stretch of Quarry Street, where there were two houses, two sets of siblings, and eventually, a tangled mess of betrayal, longing, and loss. Tragedy catapulted Allie and Ilya together, but divorce—even as neighbors—has been relatively uncomplicated. Then Ilya’s brother, Nikolai, comes home for their grandmother’s last days. He’s the guy who teased and fought with Allie, infuriated her, then fled town without a good-bye. Now Niko makes her feel something else entirely—a rush of connection and pure desire that she’s been trying to quench since one secret kiss years ago. Niko’s not sticking around. She’s not going to leave. And after all that’s happened between their families, this can’t be anything more than brief pleasure and a bad idea. But the lies we tell ourselves can’t compete with the truths our hearts refuse to let go… Advertising Show More

This collection of literature attempts to compile many of the classic, timeless works that have stood the test of time and offer them at a reduced, affordable price, in an attractive volume so that everyone can enjoy them.