Lynne Meadows has a chip on her shoulder. Her two best friends are gone. Bartley had died, and Marta left the Intermountain Ballet Company after breaking her ankle. Now Lynne s alone and a perpetual thorn in the directors lives. An accident and a string of sabotages disrupt the career she s always wanted, and she wonders how long she ll be welcome at the company.
Damien Black, the artistic director, suggests she represent her fellow dancers on an injury committee. If that goes well and her attitude improves, he and Madame Cosper, the company director, promise to recommend her to a summer dance troupe performing across France. He even asks her to introduce his new ballet, An American in Paris, in France. However, they do not promise even a limited contract once she returns. Because the cost of the trip is beyond her means, her mother asks Lynne s Uncle Leo for help.
He offers to pay for her ship s passage and give her the car he plans to buy while there if she will drive him around Europe for a month after she finishes performing. The free trip and new car excite her; she agrees to the arrangement despite his legendary lack of dependability.
After the Intermountain Ballet season ends, she works feverishly with Damien Black to learn the choreography for the trip as well as his new ballet. Her aunt sells the property where Lynne s lived for two years, so she must pack up and store her possessions, then find a new home once she returns. Two weeks before departing, she meets Noel Elijah, a rancher, who captivates her interest. Very different from the guys she s dated in the past, he s a perfect gentleman. But she s leaving. The coveted tour in France stands in the way of their budding romance.
Her summer begins on the ship to France, where Lynne meets Lucia, a dancer who is also part of the troupe; together they are invited to perform on the ship. Once they reach Paris, Lynne is assigned to share housing with Arty, another troupe dancer; and the girls form a friendship with fellow dancers Wallace and Karl. Cheryl, the dance director, approaches their practices with enthusiasm, passion, and a positive attitude that encourage Lynne to renew her love of dancing.
One day during their rare free time, the girls visit a fortuneteller, who predicts their futures. Lynne scoffs at the whole idea, but is taken aback when hers start to come true. The prediction about two men coming and going in her life unnerves her: she hopes the one leaving is not her father with new heart problems and that Noel is the one stepping into her life.
The dancers complete the tour, as well as extra performances, and are well received at an invitational waltz festival. Then they go their separate ways. Lynne must gather up the energy to stay another month with her Uncle Leo while she longs to return home to Noel and rejoin the Intermountain Ballet Company if they will take her back.
Uncle Leo returns a day late to pick her up in a tinny mini car instead of the plush one she expected. Next, he changes their plans daily to accommodate his own whims and sleeps while she does all the driving. Then he loses their money, leaving them nearly destitute. Her final and most devastating disappointment comes when he strands her in Portugal with no car, no return ticket, and only thirty dollars to make her own way over a thousand miles back to Paris and then home to Montana. She walks, hitchhikes, works for meals, and sleeps in hostels, sheds, and bus stops along the way. Through the kindness of strangers and Noel, she finally returns to Billings, only to discover Madame Cosper has had a stroke.
Prior to the Halloween dance, Sophie's biggest problems are the bitchy girls at her boarding school and her mouthy behavior landing her in detention.
Then she meets bad boy Kai. And gets the kiss that rocks her world.
That kiss reawakens Sophie's true identity: Persephone, Goddess of Spring. Now school is the least of her worries.
She's key to saving humanity and target numero uno of Hades and Zeus.
All she's gotta do is master her powers, land her bad boy crush, and save the world.
Happy Sweet Sixteen!
Sassy girls. Swoony gods. What could go wrong?
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WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO SURVIVE ABOARD A SPACESHIP FUELED BY LIES?
Amy is a cryogenically frozen passenger aboard the spaceship Godspeed. She has left her boyfriend, friends--and planet--behind to join her parents as a member of Project Ark Ship. Amy and her parents believe they will wake on a new planet, Centauri-Earth, three hundred years in the future. But fifty years before Godspeed's scheduled landing, cryo chamber 42 is mysteriously unplugged, and Amy is violently woken from her frozen slumber.
Someone tried to murder her.
Now, Amy is caught inside an enclosed world where nothing makes sense. Godspeed's 2,312 passengers have forfeited all control to Eldest, a tyrannical and frightening leader. And Elder, Eldest's rebellious teenage heir, is both fascinated with Amy and eager to discover whether he has what it takes to lead.
Amy desperately wants to trust Elder. But should she put her faith in a boy who has never seen life outside the ship's cold metal walls? All Amy knows is that she and Elder must race to unlock Godspeed's hidden secrets before whoever woke her tries to kill again.
But just as camp begins, Jane receives heartbreaking news about Beau. She loses, not just her favorite horse, but also her chance to ride in the end-of-summer competition. When her trainer asks for her help with an out-of-control chestnut warmblood, Lancelot, a newcomer to the barn, she has no choice but to say yes.
There’s another new addition to the farm: Ben Reyes, the grandson of the barn's manager. As Jane struggles to go on without Beau, and to make Lancelot the great horse she believes him to be, her feelings for Ben, her relationships with the privileged group of girls she rides with, and her painful, joyous road to self-discovery all lead to a heart-pounding conclusion that is truly a new beginning. Only Jane’s faith in Lancelot, and her own rediscovered skill and strength, can see her through the hard journey toward a horse of her own.
When she was a child, Joey Kinkaid, assigned as a boy at birth—wearing Mom’s purple sundress and an imaginary crown—ruled the Baker Street neighborhood with a flair and imagination that kept the other kids captivated. Day after day, she led them on fantastic after-school adventures, but those innocent childhood days are over, and the magic is gone. The princess is alone.
Even Eric Sinclair, the Prince Eric to Joey’s Princess Ariel, has turned his back on his former friend, watching in silence as Joey is tormented at school. Eric isn’t proud of it, but their enchanted youth is over, and they’ve been thrust into a dog-eat-dog world where those who conform survive and those who don’t… well, they don’t. Eric has enough to deal with at home, where his mother has abandoned him to live in isolation and poverty.
But Eric can’t stay on the sidelines forever. When Joey finally accepts her female gender and comes to school wearing lip gloss, leggings, and a silky pink scarf, the bullies readily take the opportunity she hands them, driving Joey to attempt suicide and leaving Eric at a crossroads—one that will influence both their lives in not just the present, but the future.
Is there a chance the two teens can be friends again, and maybe even more?
An Amazon Best Book of December 2018!
Thirteen-year-old Mouse is pretty sure her life is totally over. Now that she's been kicked out of ballet school, she has to go on her new school's ski trip basically knowing no one. Well, except too-cool-for-school Keira and Crazy Connie-May (and her adorable hamster, Mr. Jambon).
Meanwhile, Jack's life is just about to begin. He's on the way to the slopes with his school too, and all he can think about is how to successfully get his first kiss.
But with new friends by her side, Mouse has more fun skiing and building igloos than she expected. And when Jack catches Mouse's eye in the at the ski resort, he's smitten. All's well--that is, until mega pop star Roland arrives on the scene and sets his sights on Mouse, too! A week in the snow is about to get complicated. . . .
"The entwined stories are brilliantly paced...[and] riotously funny...under, around, and through the laughs, there are questions (and answers!) about friendship, image, and forgiveness, for others and for oneself." --Booklist (starred review)
"Filled with awkward misunderstandings, mistaken identities, and missed opportunities...this is adolescent drama at its best." --Kirkus Reviews
The polar bear is a royal bear, a gift from the King of Norway to the King of England. The first time Arthur encounters the bear, he is shoved in her cage as payback for stealing food. Restless and deadly, the bear terrifies him. Yet, strangely, she doesn’t harm him—though she has attacked anyone else who comes near. That makes Arthur valuable to the doctor in charge of getting the bear safely to London. So Arthur, who has run away from home, finds himself taking care of a polar bear on a ship to England.
Tasked with feeding and cleaning up after the bear, Arthur’s fears slowly lessen as he begins to feel a connection to this bear, who like him, has been cut off from her family. But the journey holds many dangers, and Arthur knows his own freedom—perhaps even his life—depends on keeping the bear from harm. When pirates attack and the ship founders, Arthur must make a choice—does he do everything he can to save himself, or does he help the bear to find freedom?
Based on the real story of a polar bear that lived in the Tower of London, this timeless adventure story is also a touching account of the bond between a boy and a bear.
At seventeen, Mei should be in high school, but skipping fourth grade was part of her parents' master plan. Now a freshman at MIT, she is on track to fulfill the rest of this predetermined future: become a doctor, marry a preapproved Taiwanese Ivy Leaguer, produce a litter of babies.
With everything her parents have sacrificed to make her cushy life a reality, Mei can't bring herself to tell them the truth--that she (1) hates germs, (2) falls asleep in biology lectures, and (3) has a crush on her classmate Darren Takahashi, who is decidedly not Taiwanese.
But when Mei reconnects with her brother, Xing, who is estranged from the family for dating the wrong woman, Mei starts to wonder if all the secrets are truly worth it. Can she find a way to be herself, whoever that is, before her web of lies unravels?
From debut author Gloria Chao comes a hilarious, heartfelt tale of how unlike the panda, life isn't always so black and white.
'Jean Gill has captured the innermost thoughts of this magnificent animal.' Les Ingham, Pyr International A dog's life in the south of France. From puppyhood, Sirius the Pyrenean Mountain Dog has been trying to understand his humans and train them with kindness. How this led to their divorce he has no idea. More misunderstandings take Sirius to Death Row in an animal shelter, as a so-called dangerous dog learning survival tricks from the other inmates. During the twilight barking, he is shocked to hear his brother's voice but the bitter-sweet reunion is short-lived. Doggedly, Sirius keeps the faith.
One day, his human will come.