Finalist for the 2020 Colorado Book Award in the Literary Fiction category presented by the Colorado Center for the Book Finalist for the 2019 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award in the Multicultural (Adult Fiction) category 2020 In the Margins Top Ten and Fiction Recommendation Matthew has grown up in hell. His father is gone, and his mother drinks and hooks up with men who abuse Matthew and his sister. He finally decides to hit the streets of Farmington to get away and to drink himself to death—in his mind, his destiny. He meets Chris, who saves him, takes him home, cleans him up, gets him sober, and initiates Matthew into one of Albuquerque's Native American gangs, the 505s. The 505s have been around for generations. They now sell heroin, and it's their subservience to the Mexican gangs that has allowed them to survive. However, Chris decides that his little Native American gang deserves to be as big as the Mexican gangs in Albuquerque, bringing in new business from deep inside Indigenous communities in Mexico. Then, Matthew falls in love with Chris's girlfriend. Matthew's story is one of terrible darkness, but also, unexpected beauty and tenderness.

I'm your protagonist-Reshma Kapoor-and if you have the free time to read this book, then you're probably nothing like me. Reshma is a college counselor's dream. She's the top-ranked senior at her ultra-competitive Silicon Valley high school, with a spotless academic record and a long roster of extracurriculars. But there are plenty of perfect students in the country, and if Reshma wants to get into Stanford, and into med school after that, she needs the hook to beat them all. What's a habitual over-achiever to do? Land herself a literary agent, of course. Which is exactly what Reshma does after agent Linda Montrose spots an article she wrote for Huffington Post. Linda wants to represent Reshma, and, with her new agent's help scoring a book deal, Reshma knows she'll finally have the key to Stanford. But she's convinced no one would want to read a novel about a study machine like her. To make herself a more relatable protagonist, she must start doing all the regular American girl stuff she normally ignores. For starters, she has to make a friend, then get a boyfriend. And she's already planned the perfect ending: after struggling for three hundred pages with her own perfectionism, Reshma will learn that meaningful relationships can be more important than success-a character arc librarians and critics alike will enjoy. Of course, even with a mastermind like Reshma in charge, things can't always go as planned. And when the valedictorian spot begins to slip from her grasp, she'll have to decide just how far she'll go for that satisfying ending. (Note: It's pretty far.) In this wholly unique, wickedly funny debut novel, Naomi Kanakia consciously uses the rules of storytelling-and then breaks them to pieces.

A traveller follow directions given to him by his Garmin and ends up at an entryway to Hell, one that bears a striking resemblance to the entrance to Hell encountered by Dante Alighieri prior to his tour of Hell in the thirteenth century

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Before The Dante Chamber, there was The Dante Club: “an ingenious thriller that . . . brings Dante Alighieri’s Inferno to vivid, even unsettling life.”—The Boston Globe “With intricate plots, classical themes, and erudite characters . . . what’s not to love?”—Dan Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code and Origin Boston, 1865. The literary geniuses of the Dante Club—poets and Harvard professors Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, and James Russell Lowell, along with publisher J. T. Fields—are finishing America’s first translation of The Divine Comedy. The powerful Boston Brahmins at Harvard College are fighting to keep Dante in obscurity, believing the infiltration of foreign superstitions to be as corrupting as the immigrants arriving at Boston Harbor. But as the members of the Dante Club fight to keep a sacred literary cause alive, their plans fall apart when a series of murders erupts through Boston and Cambridge. Only this small group of scholars realizes that the gruesome killings are modeled on the descriptions of Hell’s punishments from Dante’s Inferno. With the lives of the Boston elite and Dante’s literary future in the New World at stake, the members of the Dante Club must find the killer before the authorities discover their secret. Praise for The Dante Club “Ingenious . . . [Matthew Pearl] keeps this mystery sparkling with erudition.”—Janet Maslin, The New York Times “Not just a page-turner but a beguiling look at the U.S. in an era when elites shaped the course of learning and publishing. With this story of the Dante Club’s own descent into hell, Mr. Pearl’s book will delight the Dante novice and expert alike.”—The Wall Street Journal “[Pearl] ably meshes the . . . literary analysis with a suspenseful plot and in the process humanizes the historical figures. . . . A divine mystery.”—People (Page-turner of the Week) “An erudite and entertaining account of Dante’s violent entrance into the American canon.”—Los Angeles Times “A hell of a first novel . . . The Dante Club delivers in spades. . . . Pearl has crafted a work that maintains interest and drips with nineteenth-century atmospherics.”—San Francisco Chronicle

In the spirit of Gretchen Rubin’s megaseller The Happiness Project and Eric Weiner’s The Geography of Bliss, a journalist embarks on a project to discover what it takes to love where you live The average restless American will move 11.7 times in a lifetime. For Melody Warnick, it was move #6, from Austin, Texas, to Blacksburg, Virginia, that threatened to unhinge her. In the lonely aftermath of unpacking, she wondered: Aren’t we supposed to put down roots at some point? How does the place we live become the place we want to stay? This time, she had an epiphany. Rather than hold her breath and hope this new town would be her family’s perfect fit, she would figure out how to fall in love with it—no matter what. How we come to feel at home in our towns and cities is what Warnick sets out to discover in This Is Where You Belong. She dives into the body of research around place attachment—the deep sense of connection that binds some of us to our cities and increases our physical and emotional well-being—then travels to towns across America to see it in action. Inspired by a growing movement of placemaking, she examines what its practitioners are doing to create likeable locales. She also speaks with frequent movers and loyal stayers around the country to learn what draws highly mobile Americans to a new city, and what makes us stay. The best ideas she imports to her adopted hometown of Blacksburg for a series of Love Where You Live experiments designed to make her feel more locally connected. Dining with her neighbors. Shopping Small Business Saturday. Marching in the town Christmas parade. Can these efforts make a halfhearted resident happier? Will Blacksburg be the place she finally stays? What Warnick learns will inspire you to embrace your own community—and perhaps discover that the place where you live right now . . . is home.

Dr. Seuss’s wonderfully wise Oh, the Places You’ll Go! celebrates all of our special milestones—from graduations to birthdays and beyond! This Read & Listen edition features optional audio narration for compatible ebook readers. “[A] book that has proved to be popular for graduates of all ages since it was first published.”—The New York Times From soaring to high heights and seeing great sights to being left in a Lurch on a prickle-ly perch, Dr. Seuss addresses life’s ups and downs with his trademark humorous verse and whimsical illustrations. The inspiring and timeless message encourages readers to find the success that lies within, no matter what challenges they face. A perennial favorite for anyone starting a new phase in their life!

"KNOCK AND IT WILL BE OPENED FOR YOU." --MATTHEW 7:7 The Bible has the answers to life's most important questions. But for many teens, and even many adults, God's message can be lost in the Bible's often confusing terminology, dry language, or lengthy history lessons. Who begat who-and why should I care? The Bible: Enter Here opens the door to God's Word by breathing new life into key Bible stories, retelling them in a fresh, fun, and relatable way. You'll discover that the Bible is packed with drama, suspense, and even humor. You'll see that the Bible's main characters were real people, with the same flaws, fears, and dreams you have. And most important, you'll learn how Jesus' teachings are vital to your life today. Here are a few of the characters you'll meet: - JACOB: The guy who wrestled God-and got a nation named after him - PHARAOH: Ten plagues, and still didn't learn his lesson - DELILAH: Irresistible ... and dangerous - SHADRACH, MESHACH, and ABEDNEGO: The ultimate trial by fire - VIRGIN MARY: On parenting the Son of God - PETER: His agony and triumph, in his own words Learn how one man's life, death, and resurrection changed the world forever, and what that could mean for you-if you're ready to knock on the door and enter.