Difficult Relationships

My sophomore year changed everything. I dropped 40 pounds after a stint in fat camp. Prior to losing weight, most of my time was spent comparing myself to my twin sister and trying to hide my cankles. But losing weight made all things seem possible. Now I'm popular, vying for the hottest guy in school and competing for a prom queen nomination. Finally, I'm getting noticed, and it's all because I dropped the pounds.

Alex Craft knows how to kill someone. And she doesn't feel bad about it. Three years ago, when her older sister, Anna, was murdered and the killer walked free, Alex uncaged the language she knows best - the language of violence. While her own crime goes unpunished, Alex knows she can't be trusted among other people. Not with Jack, who wants to really know her but still feels guilty over the role he played the night Anna's body was discovered. And not with Peekay, the kid with a defiant streak who befriends Alex while they volunteer at an animal shelter. Not anyone.

Everything about Jessie is wrong. At least that's what it feels like during her first week of junior year at her new ultra-intimidating prep school in Los Angeles. Just when she's thinking about hightailing it back to Chicago, she gets an email from a person calling themselves Somebody/Nobody (SN for short), offering to help her navigate the wilds of Wood Valley High School. Is it an elaborate hoax? Or can she rely on SN for some much-needed help?

The troublemaker. The overachiever. The cheer captain. The dead girl. Like every high school in America, Jefferson-Lorne High contains all of the above. After the shocking murder of senior Emma Baines, three of her classmates are at the top of the suspect list: Claude, the notorious partier; Avery, the head cheerleader; and Gwen, the would-be valedictorian. But appearances are never what they seem. And the truth behind what really happened to Emma may just be lying in plain sight. As long buried secrets come to light, the clock is ticking to find Emma's killer.

First time I saw her was in the mirror on my locker door. I'd kicked my swim gear onto the bottom shelf and was reaching to the top for my calc book when she opened her locker across the hall. She had a streaked blonde ponytail dangling out the back of her baseball cap.... We slammed our lockers in unison and turned. Her eyes met mine. "Hi," she said, smiling. My stomach fluttered. "Hi," I answered automatically. She was new. Had to be. I would've noticed her. She sauntered away, but not before I caught a glimpse of her T-shirt. It said: IMRU? Am I what?

August is a misfit with a pyro streak, and Jack is a golden boy on the varsity rugby team - but their intense friendship goes way back. Jack begins to see increasingly vivid hallucinations that take the form of an elaborate fantasy kingdom creeping into the edges of the real world. With their parents' unreliable behavior, August decides to help Jack the way he always has - on his own. He accepts the visions as reality, even when Jack leads them on a quest to fulfill a dark prophecy.

Maleeka Madison is a dark skinned African-American girl. She feels uncomfortable and wishes she had lighter skin. When her teacher, Miss Saunders, who suffers from a rare skin condition, shows that there is more to people than the color of their skin, Maleeka learns to appreciate and accept who she truly is.

When Brittany Ellis walks into chemistry class on the first day of senior year, she has no clue that her carefully created perfect life is about to unravel before her eyes. She's forced to be lab partners with Alex Fuentes, a gang member from the other side of town, and he is about to threaten everything she's worked so hard for her flawless reputation, her relationship with her boyfriend, and the secret that her home life is anything but perfect.

Luke is the perfect boyfriend. He and Emaline have been together all through high school in Colby, the beach town where they both grew up. Enter Theo, a super-ambitious outsider. Theo's sophisticated, exciting, and, best of all, he thinks Emaline is much too smart for Colby. Emaline's mostly-absentee father, too, thinks Emaline should have a bigger life, and he's convinced that an Ivy League education is the only route to realizing her potential. Emaline wants the moon and more, but how can she balance where she comes from with where she's going?

It all starts with a text: Please, Wylie, I need your help. Wylie hasn't heard from Cassie in over a week, not since their last fight. But that doesn't matter. Cassie's in trouble, so Wylie decides to do what she has done so many times before: save her best friend from herself.

I Hunt Killers introduced the world to Jasper (Jazz) Dent, the son of the world's most infamous serial killer. When a desperate New York City detective comes knocking on Jazz's door asking for help with a new case, Jazz can't say no. The Hat-Dog Killer has the Big Apple - and its police force running scared with no leads. So Jazz and his girlfriend, Connie, hop on a plane to the big city and get swept up in a killer's murderous game. Meanwhile, Jazz's dad, Billy, is watching... and waiting.

Ten-year-old Michael was looking forward to moving into a new house. But now his baby sister is ill, his parents are frantic, and Doctor Death has come to call. Michael feels helpless. Then he steps into the crumbling garage. What is this thing beneath the spiders' webs and dead flies? A human being, or a strange kind of beast never before seen?

At one time Lew Alcindor was just another kid from New York City with all the usual problems: He struggled with fitting in, with pleasing a strict father, and with overcoming shyness that made him feel socially awkward. But with a talent for basketball and an unmatched team of supporters, Lew Alcindor was able to transform and to become Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

This guide gives you the tools to handle life's annoyances with humor and dignity. Have you ever replayed a rude comment long after it happened? Wondering why someone’s snarky remark can derail your day? Are you struggling to stay composed when a colleague cuts you off mid-sentence or when a stranger’s glare feels like an attack?

High-school senior Tyler Miller used to be the kind of guy who faded into the background. But ever since he got busted for spraying graffiti on the school, and spent the summer doing outdoor work to pay for it, he stands out like you wouldn't believe. His new physique attracts the attention of queen bee Bethany Milbury, who just happens to be Tyler's secret crush. And that sets off a string of events and changes that have Tyler questioning his place in the school, in his family, and in the world.

Samara Taylor used to believe in miracles. She used to believe in a lot of things. As a pastor's kid, it's hard not to buy in to the idea of the perfect family, a loving God, and amazing grace. But lately, Sam has a lot of reason to doubt. Her mother lands in rehab after a DUI and her father seems more interested in his congregation than his family.

By his senior year, Steve York has come through the worst two years of his life. His parents have divorced, and his girlfriend has betrayed him. Worse yet, after running away to live with his mother in San Diego, forays into the drug culture have turned his A-average into a thing of the past. Steve's only hope to graduate on time and avoid summer school is to write a 100-page paper for his guidance counselor. Unfortunately, he has to write about something he knows, and all he knows well are the last two years of his life.

Ghostgirl features Charlotte Usher, a high-schooler who can't help but feel no one knows she's alive. Then her nagging fear is confirmed. One day she no longer just feels invisible - she is, in fact, dead and literally haunting the halls.

Amsterdam, 1943. Hanneke spends her days procuring and delivering sought-after black market goods to paying customers, her nights hiding the true nature of her work from her concerned parents, and every waking moment mourning her boyfriend, who was killed on the Dutch front lines when the Germans invaded. She likes to think of her illegal work as a small act of rebellion.

Five estranged cousins are lost in a maze of their family’s tangled secrets. Their grandparents, former potato farmers Gottfried and Marla Hemmings, managed to trade digging spuds for developing subdivisions, and now they sit atop a million-dollar bank account - wealth they’ve refused to pass on to their adult children or their five teenage grandchildren. "Because we want them to thrive," Marla always says. But for the Hemmings cousins, "thriving" feels a lot like slowly dying of a poison they started taking the moment they were born.