Difficult Family

Newbery Medal winner Paul Fleischman writes a profoundly moving story of connectedness and the journey of a young soul to self-discovery. Told through the voices of five characters and narrated by age-appropriate actors, Whirligig compels the listener with its lesson on how our actions can impact the lives of others - even years later. A stunningly authentic listening experience.

Eden Monro came to California for a summer of sun, sand and celebrities - what better way to forget about the drama back home? Until she meets her new family of strangers: a dad she hasn't seen in three years, a step-monster and three stepbrothers. Eden gets her own room in her dad's fancy house in Santa Monica. A room right next door to her oldest stepbrother, Tyler Bruce. Whom she cannot stand. He's got angry green eyes and ego bigger than a Beverly Hills mansion. She's never felt such intense dislike for someone.

Lionel is a wild boy who doesn't much like to be around other people. He'd rather be a purring cat or a wolf stalking the woods. Marybeth is a nice girl. She doesn't need to be told to comb her hair or brush her teeth, and she's kind to everyone at the orphanage...Lionel most of all. Different though they are, Lionel and Marybeth are best friends in a world that has forgotten about them. So when a mysterious blue spirit possesses Marybeth - and starts to take control - they know they must stop it before the real Marybeth fades away forever.

Natalie Sterling wants to be in control. She wants her friends to be loyal. She wants her classmates to elect her student council president. She wants to find the right guy, not the usual jerk her school has to offer. She wants a good reputation, because she believes that will lead to good things. But life is messy, and it's very hard to be in control of it. Slut or saint? Winner or loser? Natalie is getting tired of these forced choices - and is now going to find a way to live life in the sometimes messy, sometimes wonderful in-between.

Elsie Dinsmore is an endearing 8-year-old girl with several bewildering problems. She has never known her mother, who died when Elsie was a baby, and she longs for a close, loving relationship with her father. He, however, has sent her off to be raised at Roselands, his brother's Southern plantation, where her teacher, Miss Day, harshly criticizes her and her cousins tease her relentlessly.

Kate has always been the good girl. Too good, according to some people at school - although they have no idea the guilty secret she carries. But this summer, everything is different. This summer she's a counselor at Cumberland Creek summer camp, and she wants to put the past behind her. This summer Matt is back as a counselor too. He's the first guy she ever kissed, and he's gone from geeky songwriter who loved The Hardy Boys to a buff lifeguard who loves to flirt - with her.

Handling Difficult People provides concrete strategies to identify and handle difficult people. The author emphasizes being proactive to handle, not just cope, with them. The audiobook first underscores your right to defend yourself as opposed to concentrating on why the difficult person is somehow right. Armed with permission to defend yourself, you can then work on identifying the four types and then employ strategies and tactics to deal with each kind.

Taylor Edwards’ family might not be the closest-knit - everyone is a little too busy and overscheduled - but for the most part, they get along just fine. Then Taylor’s dad gets devastating news, and her parents decide that the family will spend one last summer all together at their old lake house in the Pocono Mountains. Crammed into a place much smaller and more rustic than they are used to, they begin to get to know each other again. And Taylor discovers that the people she thought she had left behind haven’t actually gone anywhere.

Lizzie St. Claire wants to be invisible. Forced to move out of her home, she and her mom now live in a transitional housing shelter, Good Hope, until they can get back on their feet. She just wants to keep her head down at Good Hope and her new school so that she doesn’t have to admit the real reason she and her mom lost everything. But at the nearby Birchwood Stables, some new friends - along with the arrival of a frightened pony named Fire - help Lizzie to open up and accept help from those around her, even if it means she’ll have more to lose if things change again.

What if finding her means losing himself? Seventeen-year-old Bo has always had delusions that he could travel through time. When he was 10, Bo claimed to have witnessed the Titanic hit an iceberg, and at 15, he found himself on a Civil War battlefield, horrified by the bodies surrounding him. So when his concerned parents send him to a school for troubled youth, Bo assumes he knows the truth: that he's actually attending Berkshire Academy, a school for kids who, like Bo, have "superpowers".

Jasmine and Chelsea are best friends on a mission - they’re sick of the way women are treated even at their progressive NYC high school, so they decide to start a Women's Rights Club. They post their work online - poems, essays, videos of Chelsea performing her poetry, and Jasmine's response to the racial microaggressions she experiences - and soon go viral. But with such positive support, the club is also targeted by trolls. When things escalate, the principal shuts the club down. Not willing to be silenced, Jasmine and Chelsea will risk everything for their voices to be heard.

"A terrific book for parents who want to know how to talk about difficult, emotional issues with children."––Nancy Eisenberg, Regents' Professor of Psychology, Arizona State University ​Includes how to talk to your kids about COVID-19. In a lifesaving guide for parents, Dr. Abigail Gewirtz...

Sixteen-year-old Lex Bartleby is a teenage grim reaper with the bizarre ability to Damn souls. That makes her pretty scary, even to fellow Grims. But after inadvertently transferring her ability to Zara, a murderous outlaw, Lex is a pariah in Croak, the little town she calls home. To escape the townspeople’s wrath, she and her friends embark on a wild road trip to DeMyse. Though this sparkling desert oasis is full of luxuries and amusements, it feels like a prison to Lex.

Everybody gets angry sometimes. And for children, anger can be very upsetting. In this Caldecott-honor book, children will see what Sophie does when she gets angry. People do lots of different things when they get angry. What do you do?

Francis Joseph Cassavant is eighteen. He has just returned home from the Second World War, and he has no face. He does have a gun and a mission: to murder his childhood hero. Francis lost most of his face when he fell on a grenade in France. He received the Silver Star for bravery, but was it really an act of heroism? Now, having survived, he is looking for a man he once admired and respected, a man adored by many people, a man who also received a Silver Star for bravery. A man who destroyed Francis's life.

Strato Nyman couldn’t be more of an odd-one-out. He’s the only black kid in Hedgecombe-upon-Dray, he knows more about particle physics than his teacher, and he’s constantly picked on by the school bully. One day, Strato picks up a dusty book in a mysterious bookshop and learns how to become invisible. He discovers that people aren’t always what they seem...and realises standing out isn’t so bad after all.

James was the guy no one noticed - another 15-year-old living in a small town. So when he gets into the American Science and Mathematics Academy (or ASMA), a public boarding school, James decides that it’s time to leave the past behind. In a student body made up of nerds and geeks, being cool is easy. All it takes is a few harmless lies to invent the new James: rebel, punk, street fighter. Everyone’s impressed - except for the beautiful Ellie Frost.

Jilly thinks she's figured out how life works. But when her sister Emma is born deaf, she realizes how much she still has to learn. A big fantasy reader, Jilly connects with another fan, Derek, who is African American and a deaf ASL user. She goes to Derek for advice but doesn't always know the best way to ask for it and makes some mistakes along the way. Jilly has to step back to learn to be an ally, a sister, and a friend, understanding that life works in different ways for different people, and that being open to change can make you change in the best possible ways.

It's Christmas, but leave it to Sammy Keyes to find trouble even in the midst of the holiday parade. Trying to help a friend, she reluctantly volunteers on the Canine Calendar float, only to have the famous cover dog dog-napped on her watch! The animal's owner orders Sammy to find the dog before the $50,000 ransom being demanded comes due.

In an era where social media is taking over the world, bonding time with children has become very difficult. Finding something to keep away the children from the internet can be tricky, and that is why this audiobook has been designed for someone like you. This book is a collection of exciting, educational riddles of all genres that will surely provide you and your family with bonding activities.