The Cricket in Times Square is a delightful tale that begins one night in New York City. The usual rumbling of subway trains, thrumming of automobile tires, and hooting of horns are interrupted by a sound unfamiliar to even Tucker Mouse, a seasoned inhabitant of Times Square.

Mario, the son of Mama and Papa Bellini, who run the subway-station newsstand, hears this new, strangely musical chirping. The sound comes from Chester Cricket, a disoriented cricket from Connecticut, who was drawn to the city by the irresistible smell of liverwurst and ended up in Times Square.

Mario is thrilled to find Chester and convinces his parents to let him keep the cricket in the newsstand, assuring his mother that crickets are harmless and perhaps even good luck.

What follows is an enchanting twist on the city mouse/country mouse story, as Chester adapts to the bustling city life. Despite his comfortable matchbox bed and the company of Tucker Mouse and Harry Cat, Chester misses his peaceful life in the Connecticut countryside.

This Newbery Honor Book, charmingly illustrated by Garth Williams, captures the imagination with its vivid storytelling and timeless charm, making it a must-have for children's bookshelves.

Hikaru Shindo is like any sixth-grader in Japan: a pretty normal schoolboy with a two-tone head of hair and a penchant for antics. One day, he finds an old bloodstained Go board in his grandfather's attic--and that's when things get really interesting. Trapped inside the Go board is Fujiwara-no-Sai, the ghost of an ancient Go master who taught the strategically complex board game to the emperor of Japan many centuries ago.

In one fateful moment, Sai becomes a part of Hikaru's consciousness and together, through thick and thin, they make an unstoppable Go-playing team. Will they be able to defeat Go players who have dedicated their lives to the game? Will Sai achieve the "Divine Move" so he'll finally be able to rest in peace? Begin your journey with Hikaru and Sai in this first volume of Hikaru no Go.

In a city blasted by years of force and fury, but momentarily stilled by a cease-fire, two unlikely friends search for that most human of needs: love. But of course, a night of lust will do.

Jake Jackson and Chuckie Lurgan—one Catholic, one Protestant—navigate their sectarian city and their nonsectarian friendship with wit and style. Chuckie, an unemployed dreamer, stumbles into bliss with a beautiful American who lives in Belfast. Jake, a repo man with the soul of a poet, can only manage a hilarious war of insults with a spitfire Republican whose Irish name, properly pronounced, sounds like someone choking.

Brilliant, exuberant, and bitingly funny, Eureka Street introduces us to one of the finest young writers to emerge from Ireland in years.

Jim Hawkins has a bad attitude. What's more, he enjoys having a bad attitude about everything—especially about church. Garth Plimpton is a fanatic. He's spent so much time studying the scriptures and thick books on archaeology that he can't carry on a normal conversation with other kids. That's why they consider him a nerd.

Through an unusual chain of events, these two opposites become fast friends. It all began when Garth told Jim a simple truth: "They really existed once, you know." "Who?" Jim asked. "Nephites," Garth replied. "Every character in the Book of Mormon ate, slept, died, was buried . . ."

That statement, taken for granted before, would soon echo deeply in the two boys' minds—because they were on the trail of a chilling secret.

Anju is the daughter of an upper-caste Calcutta family; her cousin Sudha is the daughter of the black sheep of the family. Sudha is as beautiful, tenderhearted, and serious as Anju is plain, whip-smart, and defiant. Yet since the day they were born, Sudha and Anju have been bonded in ways even their mothers cannot comprehend.

The cousins' bond is shattered, however, when Sudha learns a dark family secret. Urged into arranged marriages, their lives take sudden, opposite turns: Sudha becomes the dutiful daughter-in-law of a rigid small-town household, while Anju goes to America with her new husband and learns to live her own life of secrets.

Then tragedy strikes them both, and the women discover that, despite the distance that has grown between them, they have only each other to turn to. Set in the two worlds of India and America, this is an exceptionally moving novel of love, friendship, and compelling courage.

Lily's Crossing is a touching story set during the summer of 1944, a time when World War II has changed the lives of many. Every summer, Lily and her father spend their days at their family’s house in Rockaway, near the Atlantic Ocean. But this summer is different.

With her father called overseas and her best friend Margaret moving to a wartime factory town, Lily is left to navigate this new world with her grandmother. Enter Albert, a refugee from Hungary who has lost much of his family to the war. Together, Lily and Albert form a special friendship, sharing secrets and building trust.

However, the lies they've told could have serious consequences—especially one lie that may cost Albert his life. This beautifully woven narrative explores themes of friendship, trust, and the realities of war.

Entre la narrativa detectivesca, la novela «de carretera», el relato biográfico y la crónica, Los detectives salvajes está considerada por la crítica y el público de todo el mundo como una de las mejores y más originales ficciones escritas en las últimas décadas.

Dos jóvenes poetas latinoamericanos, Arturo Belano y Ulises Lima, emprenden una aventura que transcurrirá durante varias décadas y cruzará distintos países. Símbolo de la rebeldía y la necesidad de ruptura con la realidad establecida, sus vidas representan los anhelos de toda una generación. La búsqueda en 1975 de la misteriosa escritora mexicana Cesárea Tinajero, desaparecida y olvidada en los años posteriores a la revolución, sirve de inicio a un viaje sin descanso marcado por el amor, la muerte, el deseo de libertad, el humor y la literatura.

En esta novela está esbozado, como si de un juego de cajas chinas se tratara, todo el deslumbrante universo literario y personal de Roberto Bolaño.

The majority of the following poems are to be considered as experiments. They were written chiefly with a view to ascertain how far the language of conversation in the middle and lower classes of society is adapted to the purposes of poetic pleasure.

When it was first published, Lyrical Ballads enraged the critics of the day: Wordsworth and Coleridge had given poetry a voice, one decidedly different to what had been voiced before. For Wordsworth, the important thing was the emotion aroused by the poem, and not the poem itself.

This edition offers the reader the opportunity to study the poems in their original contexts as they appeared to Coleridge's and Wordsworth's contemporaries, and includes some of their most famous poems, including Coleridge's Rime of the Ancyent Marinere.

Little Altars Everywhere is a national best-seller and a companion to Rebecca Wells' celebrated novel Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Originally published in 1992, this novel introduces Sidda, Vivi, the rest of the spirited Walker clan, and the indomitable Ya-Yas.

Told in alternating voices of Vivi and her husband, Big Shep, along with Sidda, her siblings Little Shep, Lulu, Baylor, and Cheney, and Willetta — the black couple who impact the Walkers' lives in ways they never fully comprehend — Little Altars embraces nearly thirty years of life on the plantation in Thorton, Louisiana. The cloying air of the bayou and a web of family secrets at once shelter, trap, and define an utterly original community of souls.

Who can resist the cadences of Sidda Walker and her flamboyant, secretive mother, Vivi? Here, the young Sidda — a precocious reader and an eloquent observer of the fault lines that divide her family — leads us on mischievous adventures at Our Lady of Divine Compassion parochial school and beyond. A Catholic girl of pristine manners, devotion, and provocative ideas, Sidda embodies the very essence of childhood joy and sorrow.

In a series of luminous reminiscences, we also hear Little Shep's stories of his eccentric grandmother, Lulu's account of her shoplifting skills, and Baylor's memories of Vivi and her friends, the Ya-Yas. Beneath the humor and tight-knit bonds of family and friendship lie the undercurrents of alcoholism, abuse, and violence. The overlapping recollections of how the Walkers' charming life uncoils convey their heart-breaking confusion, which is at once unsettling and familiar.

Wells creates an unforgettable portrait of the eccentric cast of characters and exposes their poignant and funny attempts to keep reality at arm's length. Through our laughter, we feel their inevitable pain, with a glimmer of hope for forgiveness and healing.

An arresting combination of colloquialism, poetry, and grace, Little Altars Everywhere is an insightful, piercing, and unflinching evocation of childhood, a loving tribute to the transformative power of faith, and a thoroughly fresh chronicle of a family that is as haunted as it is blessed.

Life Lessons from Teen to Teen

You asked for more Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul--so here it is, from the hearts of Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, and Kimberly Kirberger. You'll find 101 more stories to help you deal with a world that seems more and more difficult every day.

Jack, Mark, and Kimberly's latest batch focuses on love, friendship, and tough stuff, along with some great teen-told tales of learning lessons, making a difference, and growing up.

Like in the first volume of Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul, you'll find no adults preaching to you about what you should or shouldn't do. Instead, this book is full of teens who share their experiences on learning to accept life, becoming the best person you can be, being happy with who you are, and loving yourself--no matter what.

These stories will show you that no matter how difficult your situation may seem, you can make it through the tough times; and that no matter how lonely you may feel, you are never alone.

Modoc is a captivating true story of loyalty, friendship, and high adventure that spans several decades and three continents.

Raised together in a small German circus town, a boy and an elephant formed a bond that would last their entire lives, tested time and again through a near-fatal shipwreck in the Indian Ocean, an apprenticeship with the legendary Mahout elephant trainers in the Indian teak forests, and their eventual rise to circus stardom in 1940s New York City.

As the African Sun-Times put it, Modoc is "heartwarming...probably the greatest love story ever told."

Harry Potter's summer has included the worst birthday ever, doomy warnings from a house-elf called Dobby, and rescue from the Dursleys by his friend Ron Weasley in a magical flying car! Back at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for his second year, Harry hears strange whispers echo through empty corridors - and then the attacks start. Students are found as though turned to stone... Dobby's sinister predictions seem to be coming true.

With a plot to make most terrible things happen at Hogwarts this year, Harry's adventures include an outrageously stuck-up new professor and a spirit who haunts the girls' bathroom. More torments and horrors arise, leading to the question: Could it be Draco Malfoy, a more poisonous rival than ever? Could it possibly be Hagrid, whose mysterious past is finally told? Or could it be the one everyone at Hogwarts most suspects... Harry Potter himself?

As part of a series that has become a classic of our time, the story of the Boy Who Lived continues to bring comfort and escapism. With their message of hope, belonging, and the enduring power of truth and love, the adventures of Harry Potter delight generations of new readers.

In the summer of 1977, Victoria Leonard's world changed forever—when Caitlin Somers chose her as a friend. Dazzling, reckless Caitlin welcomed Vix into the heart of her sprawling, eccentric family, opening doors to a world of unimaginable privilege, sweeping her away to vacations on Martha's Vineyard, a magical, wind-blown island where two friends became summer sisters...Now, years later, Vix is working in New York City. Caitlin is getting married on the Vineyard. And the early magic of their long, complicated friendship has faded. But Caitlin has begged Vix to come to her wedding, to be her maid of honor. And Vix knows that she will go—for the friend whose casual betrayals she remembers all too well. Because Vix wants to understand what happened during that last shattering summer. And, after all these years, she needs to know why her best friend—her summer sister—still has the power to break her heart...

Someone Like You explores the deep and complex dynamics of friendship during times of crisis. The story centers around Halley, who has always been in the shadow of her best friend, Scarlett. However, when Scarlett's boyfriend dies in a tragic accident and she discovers she's pregnant, Halley finds herself in a new role. For the first time, Scarlett is the one in need of support, and Halley must step up to be there for her friend.

The narrative delves into how their friendship is tested but ultimately proves to be unbreakable. It's a testament to the enduring power of friendship and the lengths we go to for the people we love. This book captures the essence of being a teenager, dealing with love, loss, and the complexities of growing up.

Does growing up have to mean growing apart? Since childhood, Bryon and Mark have been as close as brothers. Now things are changing. Bryon's growing up, spending a lot of time with girls, and thinking seriously about who he wants to be. Mark still just lives for the thrill of the moment. The two are growing apart - until Bryon makes a shocking discovery about Mark. Then Bryon faces a terrible decision - one that will change both of their lives forever.

Another classic from the author of the internationally bestselling The Outsiders Continue celebrating 50 years of The Outsiders by reading this companion novel. That Was Then, This is Now is S. E. Hinton's moving portrait of the bond between best friends Bryon and Mark and the tensions that develop between them as they begin to grow up and grow apart. "A mature, disciplined novel which excites a response in the reader . . . Hard to forget."—The New York Times

The year is 1928. On the outskirts of a large German city, three young men are earning a thin and precarious living. Fully armed young storm troopers swagger in the streets. Restlessness, poverty, and violence are everywhere. For these three, friendship is the only refuge from the chaos around them. Then the youngest of them falls in love, and brings into the group a young woman who will become a comrade as well, as they are all tested in ways they can never have imagined.

Written with the same overwhelming simplicity and directness that made All Quiet on the Western Front a classic, Three Comrades portrays the greatness of the human spirit, manifested through characters who must find the inner resources to live in a world they did not make, but must endure.

Margaret Atwood's The Robber Bride is inspired by The Robber Bridegroom, a wonderfully grisly tale from the Brothers Grimm in which an evil groom lures three maidens into his lair and devours them, one by one. But in her version, Atwood brilliantly recasts the monster as Zenia, a villainess of demonic proportions, and sets her loose in the lives of three friends, Tony, Charis, and Roz.

All three have lost men, spirit, money, and time to their old college acquaintance, Zenia. At various times, and in various emotional disguises, Zenia has insinuated her way into their lives and practically demolished them. To Tony, who almost lost her husband and jeopardized her academic career, Zenia is 'a lurking enemy commando.' To Roz, who did lose her husband and almost her magazine, Zenia is 'a cold and treacherous bitch.' To Charis, who lost a boyfriend, quarts of vegetable juice and some pet chickens, Zenia is a kind of zombie, maybe 'soulless'. In love and war, illusion and deceit, Zenia's subterranean malevolence takes us deep into her enemies' pasts.

From the bestselling author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments—one of Margaret Atwood’s most unforgettable characters lurks at the center of this intricate novel like a spider in a web. The glamorous, irresistible, unscrupulous Zenia is nothing less than a fairy-tale villain in the memories of her former friends. Roz, Charis, and Tony—university classmates decades ago—were reunited at Zenia’s funeral and have met monthly for lunch ever since, obsessively retracing the destructive swath she once cut through their lives. A brilliantly inventive fabulist, Zenia had a talent for exploiting her friends’ weaknesses, wielding intimacy as a weapon and cheating them of money, time, sympathy, and men. But one day, five years after her funeral, they are shocked to catch sight of Zenia: even her death appears to have been yet another fiction. As the three women plot to confront their larger-than-life nemesis, Atwood proves herself a gleefully acute observer of the treacherous shoals of friendship, trust, desire, and power.

When she was about to turn five, a little girl named Rae Hansen invited Richard Bach to her birthday party. Though deserts, storms, mountains, and a thousand miles separated them, Rae was confident that her friend would appear.

There's No Such Place As Far Away chronicles the exhilarating spiritual journey that delivered Rae's anxiously awaited guest to her side on that special day—and tells of the powerful and enduring gift that would keep him forever close to her heart.

Written with the same elegant simplicity that made Jonathan Livingston Seagull a bestselling phenomenon, There's No Such Place As Far Away has touched the hearts of thousands of readers since its first publication. Richard Bach's inspiring, now-classic tale is a profound reminder that miles cannot truly separate us from friends...that those we love are always with us—every moment of the infinite celebration we call life.

Before his brain began to shrink, Barney Panofsky clung to two cherished beliefs: Life was absurd, and nobody truly understood anybody else. Even his friends tend to agree that Barney is a wife-abuser, an intellectual fraud, a purveyor of pap, a drunk with a penchant for violence and probably a murderer. But when his sworn enemy threatens to publish this calumny, Barney is driven to write his own memoirs, rewinding the spool of his life, editing, selecting, and plagiarising, as his memory plays tricks on him—and on the reader.

Ebullient and perverse, he has seen off three wives: the enigmatic Clara, whom he drove to suicide in Paris in 1952; the garrulous Second Mrs. Panofsky; and finally Miriam, who stayed married to him for decades before running off with a sober academic. Houdini-like, Barney slides from crisis to success, from lowlife to highlife in Montreal, Paris, and London, his outrageous exploits culminating in the scandal he carries around like a humpback—the murder charge that he goes on denying to the end.

"A land at the top of a tree!" said Connie. "I don't believe a word of it."

Jo, Bessie, and Fanny are fed up when Connie comes to stay - she's so stuck-up and bossy. But they don't let her stop them from having fun with their tree-friends, Silky, Moon-Face, and the Saucepan Man.

Together, they climb through the cloud at the top of the Faraway Tree and visit the wonderful places there, the Land of Secrets and the Land of Treats - and Connie learns to behave herself!

When cartoonist Bill Watterson announced that his phenomenally popular cartoon strip would be discontinued, Calvin and Hobbes fans throughout the world went into mourning. Fans have learned to survive — despite the absence of the boy and his tiger in the daily newspaper.

It's a Magical World delivers all the satisfaction of visiting its characters once more. Calvin fans will be able to see their favorite mischief maker stir it up with his furry friend, long-suffering parents, classmate Susie Derkins, school teacher Miss Wormwood, and Rosalyn the baby-sitter.

It's a Magical World includes full-color Sundays and has it all: Calvin-turned-firefly waking Hobbes with his flashlight glow; courageous Spaceman Spiff rocketing through alien galaxies as he battles Dad-turned-Bug-Being; and Calvin's always inspired snowman art.

There's no better way for Watterson fans to savor again the special qualities of their favorite strip.

Twenty years ago, Claire Maloney was the willful, pampered, tomboyish daughter of the town's most respected family. Despite her privileged background, she formed an unlikely friendship with Roan Sullivan, a fierce, motherless boy who lived in a rusted-out trailer amid junked cars.

No one in Dunderry, Georgia—least of all Claire’s family—could understand the bond between these two mavericks. But Roan and Claire belonged together . . . until that dark afternoon when violence and terror overtook them, and Roan disappeared from Claire's life.

Now, two decades later, Claire is adrift, and the Maloneys are still hoping the past can be buried under the rich Southern soil. But Roan Sullivan is about to walk back into their lives...

By turns tender, sexy, heartbreaking, and exuberant, A Place to Call Home is an enthralling journey between two hearts. It's a deliciously original novel from one of the most imaginative and appealing new voices in Southern fiction.

Harry Potter has never even heard of Hogwarts when the letters start dropping on the doormat at number four, Privet Drive. Addressed in green ink on yellowish parchment with a purple seal, they are swiftly confiscated by his grisly aunt and uncle. Then, on Harry's eleventh birthday, a great beetle-eyed giant of a man called Rubeus Hagrid bursts in with some astonishing news: Harry Potter is a wizard, and he has a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. An incredible adventure is about to begin!

With their message of hope, belonging and the enduring power of truth and love, the story of the Boy Who Lived continues to delight generations of new readers.

With the Leran threat laid to rest, Alec and Seregil are now able to turn their attention to the ancient evil which threatens their land. The Plenimarans, at war with Skalans, have decided to defeat their ancient enemy by raising up the Dead God, Seriamaius.

The early attempts at this reincarnation—masterminded by the sinister Duke Mardus and his sorcerous minion Vargul Ashnazai—once left Seregil in a sorcerous coma. Now, an ancient prophecy points to his continuing role in the quest to stop Mardus in his dread purpose.

Seregil's friend and Mentor, the wizard Nysander, has long been the guardian of a deadly secret. In a secret, silver-lined room hidden well beneath the Oreska, he has served for most of his 300 years as the keeper of a nondescript clay cup. But this cup, combined with a crystal crown and some wooden disks, forms the Helm of Seriamaius, and any mortal donning the reconstructed Helm will become the incarnation of the god on earth.

Nysander holds the cup and Mardus the wooden disks—one of which was responsible for Seregil's coma—but the crown must still be located. Threatened under pain of death by Nysander to keep his quest a secret even from his loyal companion, Alec, Seregil is dispatched to find the last missing piece of the Helm so that he and Nysander can destroy it.

But this is only the beginning of one of his deadliest journeys ever, for the prophecy also holds that four will come together in a time of darkness, and gradually all that Seregil values is placed at risk as he, Alec, Nysander, and Micum are drawn into a deadly web of terror and intrigue.

Abandoned as an infant by his father, the evil warlord Swartt Sixclaw, Veil is raised by the kindhearted Bryony. Despite concerns from everyone at Redwall, Bryony is convinced that Veil's goodness will prevail.

But when he commits a crime that is unforgivable, he is banished from the abbey forever. Then Swartt and his hordes of searats and vermin attack Redwall, and Veil has to decide: Should he join Swartt in battle against the only creature who has ever loved him? Or should he turn his back on his true father?

Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul is your handbook for surviving and succeeding during the exciting teen years with both your sanity and sense of humour intact. It contains invaluable lessons on the nature of friendship and love, the importance of belief in the future, and the value of respect for yourself and others.

Without feeling criticized or judged, you'll relate to and learn from the inspirational stories. Like a good friend, Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul will be there for you when you need someone and cheer you up when you're down.

Includes three of the best-loved classics in children's literature:

Charlotte's Web is a Newbery Award-winning story of one fine swine and a spider named Charlotte who changed his life forever.

The Trumpet of the Swan is the joyous tale of Louis, a trumpeter swan in search of his voice.

Stuart Little is the story of a most unusual mouse that sets out on the adventure of a lifetime.

The Giant's House is an unusual love story about a little librarian on Cape Cod and the tallest boy in the world. This magical first novel from Elizabeth McCracken captures the essence of unexpected connections and the beauty of peculiar relationships.

Set in the year 1950, in a quaint town on Cape Cod, twenty-six-year-old librarian Peggy Cort feels like love and life have stood her up. That is, until the day James Carlson Sweatt—the "over tall" eleven-year-old boy who's the talk of the town—walks into her library and changes her life forever.

Two misfits whose lonely paths cross at the circulation desk, Peggy and James are odd candidates for friendship. Yet, they soon find their lives entwined in ways neither could have predicted. In James, Peggy discovers the one person who's ever truly understood her, and as he grows—six foot five at age twelve, then seven feet, then eight—so does her heart and their singular romance.

The Giant's House is a tender and quirky novel about learning to welcome unexpected miracles and the strength of choosing love in a world that offers no promises or guarantees.

Betsy returns from Europe to marry Joe Willard—and soon learns that beloved friend Tacy is expecting a baby! It's wartime in America, but Betsy, Joe, and their wonderful circle of friends brave their hardships together.

On an Illinois farm in the 1920s, a man is murdered, and in the same moment, the tenuous friendship between two lonely boys comes to an end. In telling their interconnected stories, American Book Award winner William Maxwell delivers a masterfully restrained and magically evocative meditation on the past.

When Dorothy triumphed over the Wicked Witch of the West in L. Frank Baum's classic tale, we heard only her side of the story. But what about her arch-nemesis, the mysterious witch? Where did she come from? How did she become so wicked? And what is the true nature of evil?

Gregory Maguire creates a fantasy world so rich and vivid that we will never look at Oz the same way again. Wicked is about a land where animals talk and strive to be treated like first-class citizens, Munchkinlanders seek the comfort of middle-class stability, and the Tin Man becomes a victim of domestic violence. And then there is the little green-skinned girl named Elphaba, who will grow up to become the infamous Wicked Witch of the West, a smart, prickly, and misunderstood creature who challenges all our preconceived notions about the nature of good and evil.

Brilliantly inventive, Wicked offers a radical new portrait of one of the most feared and despised villains in all of literature: the universally maligned Wicked Witch of the West who, in Maguire’s imaginative retelling, isn’t nearly as black-hearted as we imagined.

Michael Cunningham’s celebrated novel is the story of two boyhood friends: Jonathan, lonely, introspective, and unsure of himself; and Bobby, hip, dark, and inarticulate. In New York after college, Bobby moves in with Jonathan and his roommate, Clare, a veteran of the city's erotic wars.

Bobby and Clare fall in love, scuttling the plans of Jonathan, who is gay, to father Clare's child. Then, when Clare and Bobby have a baby, the three move to a small house upstate to raise "their" child together and, with an odd friend, Alice, create a new kind of family.

A Home at the End of the World masterfully depicts the charged, fragile relationships of urban life today.

The Best School Year Ever — That's the kind of junior year Betsy Ray has planned for herself. And when her childhood friend Tib Muller moves back to Deep Valley, Betsy's sure her perfect year is off to a grand start.

With charming, funny Tib around, Crowd doings are more fun than ever — especially after Betsy starts Okto Delta, the first-ever sorority at Deep Valley High.

But soon, Betsy's luck takes a bad turn. The Crowd is getting into trouble at school, and Betsy isn't given a chance to compete in the annual Essay Contest. Could Betsy's best school year turn out to be her worst?

Countless tombstones stand in rows throughout a small community, forming a bizarre tableau. What fate awaits a brother and sister after a traffic accident in this town of the dead? In another tale, a girl falls silent, her tongue transformed into a slug. Can a friend save her? Then, when a young man moves to a new town, he finds the house next door has only a single window. What does his grotesque neighbor want, calling out to him every evening from that lone window?

Fresh nightmares brought to you by horror master Junji Ito.

Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat chronicles the multifarious adventures of this wild child and his faithful, but skeptical, friend. If the best cartoons compel readers to identify themselves within the funny frames, then all who enjoy Calvin and Hobbes are creative, imaginative, and ... bad, bad, bad!

Calvin, the irascible little boy with the stuffed tiger who comes to life, are a pair bound for trouble. Boring school lessons become occasions for death-defying alien air battles, speeding snow sled descents elicit philosophical discussions on the meaning of life, and Hobbe's natural inclination to pounce on his little friend wreaks havoc on Calvin's sense of security.

Calvin's the kid we all wish we'd been. Sassy, imaginative, far more verbal than his parents can manage, Calvin is the quintessential bad boy -- and the boy we love to see. He terrorizes little Susie, offers "Candid Opinions" from a neighborhood stand, and questions his parents' authority. "What assurance do I have that your parenting isn't screwing me up?" he demands.

Calvin and Hobbes manages to say what needs to be said about childhood and life: "Eww, mud," says Calvin. "Look at this gooshy, dirty, slimy, thick, wet mud ... Bleecch ... Talk about a kid magnet!"

An award-winning novel about growing up and making choices.

Virginia Euwer Wolff's groundbreaking novel, written in free verse, tells the story of fourteen-year-old LaVaughn, who is determined to go to college—she just needs the money to get there. When she answers a babysitting ad, LaVaughn meets Jolly, a seventeen-year-old single mother with two kids by different fathers.

As she helps Jolly make lemonade out of the lemons her life has given her, LaVaughn learns some lessons outside the classroom.

Sally Lockhart's friend and partner-in-adventure, Jim Taylor, has just solved a mystery. For years, he's been searching for Adelaide, the little girl enslaved by the toothless crone, Mrs. Holland, in The Ruby in the Smoke. And now he's found her—just as she's about to become a princess.

Crown Princess of Razkavia, to be exact, and a princess in danger. Her future husband is desperate to protect his bride and employs Jim as their bodyguard. Razkavia's quaint little streets are full of danger.

This thrilling conclusion to the Sally Lockhart series follows Sally's good friend Jim Taylor. Now a dashing detective, Jim has spent years looking for Adelaide, the young girl who helped Sally and her friends so long ago. The last time Jim Taylor saw Adelaide, her life was in grave danger, and when a carriage mysteriously explodes outside her new home, it seems nothing's changed.

But Adelaide is no longer a frightened orphan from the slums of England, for she has recently married a prince of a small nation—a nation at the heart of an international power struggle. When her husband is assassinated, Adelaide finds herself crowned queen—a position that seems to require all of the survival skills she learned on the streets. With Jim's help, Adelaide rules the country until political intrigue has them both on the run for their very lives, as the fate of the nation hangs in the balance.

On an unnamed island off an unnamed coast, objects are disappearing: first hats, then ribbons, birds, roses—until things become much more serious. Most of the island's inhabitants are oblivious to these changes, while those few imbued with the power to recall the lost objects live in fear of the draconian Memory Police, who are committed to ensuring that what has disappeared remains forgotten.

When a young woman who is struggling to maintain her career as a novelist discovers that her editor is in danger from the Memory Police, she concocts a plan to hide him beneath her floorboards. As fear and loss close in around them, they cling to her writing as the last way of preserving the past.

A surreal, provocative fable about the power of memory and the trauma of loss, The Memory Police is a stunning new work from one of the most exciting contemporary authors writing in any language.

Three of a Kind

Betsy and Tacy are best friends. Then Tib moves into the neighborhood and the three of them start to play together. The grown-ups think they will quarrel, but they don't. Sometimes they quarrel with Betsy's and Tacy's bossy big sisters, but they never quarrel among themselves.

They are not as good as they might be. They cook up awful messes in the kitchen, throw mud on each other and pretend to be beggars, and cut off each other's hair. But Betsy, Tacy, and Tib always manage to have a good time.

Ever since their first publication in the 1940s, the Betsy-Tacy stories have been loved by each generation of young readers.

Birdy is an inventive, hypnotic novel that explores the intricacies of friendship and the depths of human dreams. Set against the backdrop of World War II, it tells the story of two friends with contrasting personalities.

Al is a bold, hot-tempered boy whose goals in life are to lift weights and pick up girls. In contrast, his strange friend Birdy is a skinny, tongue-tied, perhaps genius who dreams of raising canaries and flying. Their friendship is tested in the brutal reality of war, where dreams become all too real, and their lives are changed forever.

In Birdy, William Wharton crafts an unforgettable tale that suggests another notion of sanity in a world that is manifestly insane. It's a story about love and war, madness and beauty, and above all, the essence of "birdness."

Calvin and Hobbes are back! The energetic six-year-old and his sidekick tiger endure all the trials of youth and continue to endear themselves to millions of loyal readers in this latest collection of their shenanigans.

With the help of his faithful stuffed tiger companion and his alter egos—Spaceman Spiff, Stupendous Man, and Tracer Bullet—Calvin continues to navigate the tricky waters of youth.

This latest assembly of Calvin and Hobbes' adventures has never been collected in book form before.

Long before there was Harry Potter, there was Nita Callahan and her friend Kit. Nita doesn't have a highly significant scar on her forehead, nor does she live with abusive adoptive parents. She's a perfectly ordinary girl living with her perfectly amiable family (well, her younger sister, Dairine, is impossible, but that's the way younger sisters are) on Long Island, where she goes to public school and has problems with the class bully.

Then one day she runs across one of those little books that help young people decide on a career: So You Want To Be a Doctor; So You Want To Be a Plumber; So You Want To Be a Wizard... Nita can't resist. She takes it home; she studies it; she recites the Wizard's Oath she finds inside—and she finds herself launched on a whole series of dangerously magical adventures. They take her to the depths of the ocean, to the moon and beyond, and to other dimensions entirely. She meets and befriends (and sometimes does battle with) wizards of all sorts and species. And every so often she, Kit and Dairine save the universe.

Commissioned to rescue Governor Bligh of Bounty fame, Captain Jack Aubrey and his friend and surgeon Stephen Maturin sail the Leopard to Australia with a hold full of convicts. Among them is a beautiful and dangerous spy—and a treacherous disease that decimates the crew.

With a Dutch man-of-war to windward, the undermanned, outgunned Leopard sails for her life into the freezing waters of the Antarctic, where, in mountain seas, the Dutchman closes.

After being run out of Boneville, the three Bone cousins, Fone Bone, Phoney Bone, and Smiley Bone, are separated and lost in a vast uncharted desert. One by one, they find their way into a deep, forested valley filled with wonderful and terrifying creatures...

Humor, mystery, and adventure are spun together in this action-packed, side-splitting saga. Everyone who has ever left home for the first time only to find that the world outside is strange and overwhelming will love Bone.

Captain Jack Aubrey is ashore on half pay without a command—until Stephen Maturin arrives with secret orders for Aubrey to take a frigate to the Cape of Good Hope under a commodore's pennant. There, he is to mount an expedition against the French-held islands of Mauritius and La Réunion. However, the difficulties of carrying out his orders are compounded by two of his own captains—Lord Clonfert, a pleasure-seeking dilettante, and Captain Corbett, whose severity pushes his crew to the verge of mutiny.

This captivating tale, set during the Napoleonic wars, follows Aubrey as he navigates the challenges of leadership and warfare.

Sometimes they talk all night long. In the still darkness of their cell, Molina re-weaves the glittering and fragile stories of the film he loves, and the cynical Valentin listens. Valentin believes in the just cause which makes all suffering bearable; Molina believes in the magic of love which makes all else endurable. Each has always been alone, and always - especially now - in danger of betrayal. But in cell 7, each surrenders to the other something of himself that he has never surrendered before.

This graceful, intensely compelling novel about love and victimization takes place in an Argentine prison. Molina, a gay window dresser who is self-centered, self-denigrating, yet charming, and Valentin, an articulate, fiercely dogmatic revolutionary, are gradually transformed by their guarded but growing friendship and by Molina’s obsession with the fantasy and romance of the movies.

In this collection, Calvin and his tiger-striped sidekick, Hobbes, are hilarious whether the two are simply lounging around philosophizing about the future of mankind or plotting their latest money-making scheme.

Chock-full of the familiar adventures of Spaceman Spiff, findings of Dad's popularity poll, and time travel to the Jurassic Age, Scientific Progress Goes "Boink" is guaranteed to set scientific inquiry back an eon—and advance the reading pleasure of all Calvin and Hobbes fans.

The praise and popularity of Calvin and Hobbes continue to escalate as the hottest comic strip around reaches its fifth birthday. With keen insight, Bill Watterson depicts life through the eyes of a child, and the limits of our imaginations are challenged as we accompany Calvin and Hobbes while they stir up trouble, travel through time, transmogrify themselves—and just have fun in everything they do.

This collection of Calvin and Hobbes cartoons includes adventures where Calvin crashes his parents' car, goes on a family camping trip, and shares fun-filled moments with his stuffed tiger, Hobbes.