Adventure

Monterey Shorts 2
Joyce Krieg, Ken Jones, Byron Merritt, Chris Kemp
Twenty new stories by the authors' collective that brought you the original Monterey Shorts. Once again, all stories take place in and around the Monterey Peninsula, and span all genres: mystery, fantasy, historical fiction, weird fiction and adventure. A must for all fans of the area. You do not have to buy the first volume to enjoy the second, although it adds to the richness of the reading experience as some characters span both volumes.
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Small Steps
Louis Sachar

Two years after being released from Camp Green Lake, Armpit is home in Austin, Texas, trying to turn his life around. But it’s hard when you have a record, and everyone expects the worst from you. The only person who believes in him is Ginny, his 10-year old disabled neighbor. Together, they are learning to take small steps. And he seems to be on the right path, until X-Ray, a buddy from Camp Green Lake, comes up with a get-rich-quick scheme. This leads to a chance encounter with teen pop sensation, Kaira DeLeon, and suddenly his life spins out of control, with only one thing for certain. He’ll never be the same again.In his first major novel since Holes, critically acclaimed novelist Louis Sachar uses his signature wit combined with a unique blend of adventure and deeply felt characters to explore issues of race, the nature of celebrity, the invisible connections that determine a person’s life, and what it takes to stay on course. Doing the right thing is never a wrong choice–but a small step in the right direction.
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The Adventures of Vin Fiz
Clive Cussler
Ten-year-old twins Lacey and Casey Nicefolk have always wanted to fly, but kids can’t fly . . . or can they? They can if they know the mysterious Sucoh Sucop, a man who claims to have an enchanted box that can transform any toy into the real thing! Before you know it, the twins, along with their droopy-eared basset hound, Floopy, are soaring cross-country in a real-live Wright brothers biplane, which they name Vin Fiz (after Casey’s favorite grape soda). But dangers lurk everywhere, and if the twins are to make it all the way to New York, their courage will have to make heroes of them many times over. Thank goodness they have the magical Vin Fiz on their side!
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In High Places
Harry Turtledove
In the 21st-century Kingdom of Versailles, the roads are terrible and Paris is a dirty little town. Serfdom and slavery are both common, and no one thinks that's wrong. Why should they? Most people spend their lives doing backbreaking farm work anyway. But teenaged Khadija, daughter of a prosperous family of Moorish business travellers, is unfazed. That’s because Khadija is really Annette Klein from 21st-century California, and her whole family are secret agents of Crosstime Traffic, trading for commodities to send back to our own timeline. Now it's time for Annette and her family to go home for the start of another school year, so they join a pack train bound for their home base in Marseilles, where the crosstime portal is hidden. Then bandits attack while they're crossing the Pyrenees. Annette/Khadija is separated from her parents and knocked out, and wakes up to find herself a captive in a caravan of slaves being taken to the markets in the south. She's in a tight spot. Then the really scary thing happens: her purchasers take her, along with other newly purchased slaves, to an unofficial crosstime portal…leaving open the question of whether Crosstime Traffic will ever be able to recover her!
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Return to Quag Keep
Jean Rabe, Andre Norton
Many people might not know that Andre Norton wrote the first novel based in the Dungeons and Dragons Universe. That book was Quag Keep. Now Andre with role-playing icon Jean Rabe has returned to tell a new tale of those magically transported gamers in the fantasy realm that has become all too real for them.In The Return to Quag Keep these brave adventurers try to unlock the secrets of this magical world and maybe even return home to ours. Filled with classic dungeon crawls, mysterious wizards, and attacking dragons The Return to Quag Keep is a must for all role-playing fans as well as seminal Andre Norton fans.
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Farseed
Pamela Sargent
Centuries ago, the people of Earth sent Ship into space. Deep within its core, it carried the seed of humankind…More than twenty years have passed since Ship left its children, the seed of humanity, on an uninhabited, earthlike planet--a planet they named Home. Zoheret and her companions have started settlements and had children of their own. But, as on board Ship, there was conflict, and soon after their arrival, Zoheret's old nemesis, Ho, left the original settlement to establish his own settlement far away. When Ho's daughter, fifteen-year-old Nuy, spies three strangers headed toward their settlement, the hostility between the two groups of old shipmates begins anew and threatens to engulf the children of both settlements. Can the divided settlers face the challenges of adapting to their new environment in spite of their conflicts? And if they do, will they lose their humanity in the process?
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The Quest for the Trilogy
Mel Odom
The secret to protecting the civilized world from an ancient threat may lie in the pages of three books…and it is up to master librarians of the past and present to secure these pages of knowledge.Set in the years after Lord of the Libraries, young halfer Juhg is still growing into his job as Grandmagister when an ally from the past, the wizened wizard Craugh returns with warnings of an ancient threat that may resurface--the so-called "Kharrion's Wrath" which endangers the existence of the world. Juhg must now unlock the secrets contained in the journals of his now absent mentor Wick, the former Grandmagister and legendary hero known as "The Rover." He must also continue his documented but clandestine search for a trilogy of books, which brings him through many different realms of their very dangerous world…and into conflict and contact with other races (elves, dwarves, and men) whose fates are all intertwined among the pages of the great book of Time. The Quest for the Trilogy weaves three separate quests into one as the young historian races against the clock to protect not just his world, but all others as well.
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Secrets of My Hollywood Life
Jen Calonita
What if... Your picture was taped inside teenage boys' lockers across America, your closets were bursting with never-worn designer clothing, and the tabloids constantly asked whether you were losing your "good girl" status?It's a glamorous life, but sixteen-year-old Kaitlin Burke, costar of one of the hottest shows on TV, is exhausted from the pressures of fame. Then she hits on an outrageously daring solution, one that has to remain top secret or it will jeopardize everything she's ever worked for.
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Plenty Porter
Brandon Noonan
A lyrical coming-of-age novel, in the tradition of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRDWhen Plenty Porter was born, she didn't have a name. Her parents had gone through all their favorites with the others. The doctor asked, "Think you'll have another?" Her mother kept her answer to herself. Her father said, "No, eleven is plenty."I am Plenty Porter. I am plenty.The daughter of poor share-croppers in rural Illinois, Plenty Porter is the youngest of eleven children. In their cramped, old farmhouse, with thirteen mouths needing to be fed, Plenty feels as though she is "one too many." But when she develops a special friendship with a boy named Ed-the son of a wealthy landowner-together they come to terms with what it means to be on the outside, and how the word "family" is truly defined.A stunning debut by screenwriter Brandon Noonan, PLENTY PORTER is an evocative and poignant coming-of-age novel. Rich in texture, and masterfully crafted, PLENTY PORTER introduces a timeless heroine with an unforgettable voice.
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Halcyon Blithe: Dragonfrigate Wizard
James M. Ward
His yeoman voyage now behind him, Blithe must now accept new responsibilities as he ascends to the rank of DRAGONFRIGATE WIZARD HALCYON BLITHE.In the latest chapter of the young wizard's nautical education he finds himself second in command of a captured enemy vessel that must engage a demonship in combat before returning to port. Upon his return he is assigned duty on a dwarven dragonship where he and his shipmates encounter the deceit of politics and diplomacy before they can regain the security of their Arcanian dragonship and the company of their trusted crewmates.Combining elements of Hornblower with Harry Potter, and Robert Louis Stevenson with Robin Hobb, the Halcyon Blithe are nautical tales rich in magic and intrigue set against a panorama of fantastic naval battles as we follow the career of a young midshipwizard as he moves up through the ranks of His Majesty's Navy.