Difficult Family

In his entertaining and inspiring follow-up to Love Does, Bob Goff takes listeners on a journey into the secret of living without fear, constraint, or worry. This liberated existence we all long for is as simple to say as it is difficult to do: We are called to love everybody, always – even when it’s really difficult.

Jess Aarons has been practicing all summer so he can be the fastest runner in the fifth grade. And he almost is, until the new girl in school, Leslie Burke, outpaces him. The two become fast friends and spend most days in the woods behind Leslie's house, where they invent an enchanted land called Terabithia. One morning, Leslie goes to Terabithia without Jess and a tragedy occurs.

At the heart of dealing with difficult people is handling their—and your own—emotions. How do you stay calm in a tough conversation? How do you stay unruffled in the face of passive-aggressive comments? And how do you know if you're difficult to work with? This book explains the research behind our emotional response to awful colleagues and shows how to build the empathy and resilience to make those relationships more productive.

It's just a small story really, about, among other things, a girl, some words, an accordionist, some fanatical Germans, a Jewish fist-fighter, and quite a lot of thievery. Set during World War II in Germany, Markus Zusak's groundbreaking new novel is the story of Liesel Meminger, a foster girl living outside of Munich. Liesel scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can't resist: books.

Have you ever opened your mouth to discipline your child, and your parents' nastiest words tumble out? In an era when most parenting books focus on the child, this book supports parents in dealing more positively with themselves, as well as their toddler-to-school-age children, offering specific tools to stop policing and pleading with kids and start being the parents we want to be. Based on Dr. Bailey's more than 25 years of work with children, this book explains that how we discipline ourselves is ultimately how we discipline our children.

While Jude fought for power in the Court of Elfhame against the cruel Prince Cardan, her sister, Taryn, began to fall in love with the trickster Locke. Half-apology and half-explanation, it turns out Taryn has some secrets of her own to reveal.

With Cayne's fate in the hands of his enemies and Julia spirited away to the covert Stained compound, the two are separated by impenetrable walls and a gulf of unanswered questions. Soon Julia learns the truth about the Stained and the plans they have for her, the compound is attacked, and a new group is running from an unwanted destiny, searching the globe in pursuit of the knowledge that just might save them all.

Reef and Theo don't know what's happening to them. They'll be going about their days and then suddenly they'll have these strange flashes of memory—but the memories don't belong to them. And at the same time, their own memories are starting to... vanish. For Reef, this is a big problem, because memories are all he has left of his mom. For Theo, it's strange because the new memories give him a freedom he doesn't have with his domineering dad.

Janie Johnson's life has been in turmoil ever since she discovered she was kidnapped as a young child. Visiting and getting acquainted with her birth family was difficult. As the story spread throughout high school, facing her curious classmates was even worse. Maybe this year will be better now that she's no longer the focus of attention and she will be a mature junior. But late one night she hears her friend Reeve hosting a call-in program on a college radio station. To her horror, he reveals her story to his fans.

Theodore Finch is fascinated by death, and he constantly thinks of ways he might die. But each time, something good, no matter how small, stops him. Violet Markey lives for the future, counting the days until graduation, when she can escape her Indiana town and her aching grief in the wake of her sister's recent death. When Finch and Violet meet on the ledge of the bell tower at school, it's unclear who saves whom.

When autumn arrives on 141st Street, the Vanderbeekers are busy helping Mr. Beiderman get ready for the New York City Marathon and making sure the mysterious person sleeping in the community garden gets enough to eat. But when they discover the true identity of the person making a home in the community garden’s shed, their world turns upside down as they learn what it means to care for someone in an impossible situation.

Thirteen-year-old Stewart is academically brilliant but socially clueless. Fourteen-year-old Ashley is the undisputed "it" girl in her class, but her grades stink. Their worlds are about to collide when Stewart and his dad move in with Ashley and her mom. Stewart is trying to be 89.9 percent happy about it, but Ashley is 110 percent horrified. She already has to hide the real reason her dad moved out; "Spewart" could further threaten her position at the top of the social ladder.

Darius Kellner speaks better Klingon than Farsi, and he knows more about Hobbit social cues than Persian ones. He’s a Fractional Persian - half, his mom’s side - and his first-ever trip to Iran is about to change his life. Darius has never really fit in at home, and he’s sure things are going to be the same in Iran. His clinical depression doesn’t exactly help matters, and trying to explain his medication to his grandparents only makes things harder. Then Darius meets Sohrab, the boy next door, and everything changes.

For most girls, sleepaway camp is great fun. But for Amy Becker, it's a nightmare. Amy, whose home life is in turmoil, is sent to Camp Takawanda for Girls for the first time as a teenager. Although Amy swears she hates her German-immigrant mother, who is unduly harsh with Amy's autistic younger brother, Amy is less than thrilled about going to camp. At Takawanda she is subjected to a humiliating "initiation" and relentless bullying by the ringleader of the senior campers.

Clay Jensen returns home from school to find a strange package with his name on it lying on his porch. Inside he discovers several cassette tapes recorded by Hannah Baker, his classmate and crush, who committed suicide two weeks earlier. Hannah's voice explains that there are 13 reasons she decided to end her life. Clay is one of them. If he listens, he'll find out why.

Before they were the Boxcar Children, Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny Alden lived with their parents on Fair Meadow Farm. Although times are hard, the Aldens are happy—“the best family of all,” Mama likes to say. One day, a blizzard hits the countryside, and a traveling family needs shelter. The Aldens take them in, and the strangers soon become friends. But things never stay the same at the farm, and the spring and summer bring events that will forever change their lives.

Using the newest research on human attachment and brain development, Terri Apter, an internationally acclaimed psychologist and writer, unlocks the mysteries of this complicated bond. She showcases the five different types of difficult mother - the angry mother, the controlling mother, the narcissistic mother, the envious mother, and the emotionally neglectful mother - and explains the patterns of behavior seen in each type.

Perfect for fans of Adam Silvera and Becky Albertalli, Mason Deaver's groundbreaking debut will rip your heart out before showing you how to heal from tragedy and celebrate life in the process. When Ben De Backer comes out to their parents as nonbinary, they're thrown out of their house and forced to move in with their estranged older sister, Hannah, and her husband, Thomas, whom Ben has never even met. Struggling with an anxiety disorder, they come out only to Hannah, Thomas, and their therapist and try to keep a low profile in a new school.

In a single moment, everything changes. Seventeen-year-old Mia has no memory of the accident; she can only recall riding along the snow-wet Oregon road with her family. Then, in a blink, she finds herself watching as her own damaged body is taken from the wreck.

Welcome to New York City's Upper East Side, where my friends and I live, go to school, play, and sleep - sometimes with each other. S is back from boarding school, and if we aren't careful, she's going to win over our teachers, wear that dress we couldn't fit into, steal our boyfriends' hearts, and basically ruin our lives in a major way. I'll be watching closely....