A blonde Irish woman sits in an ice-cream parlour on Le Loi Street singing, a crowd of Vietnamese street children around her, their eyes riveted on her smiling face... Christina Noble knows the pain and loneliness of being left outside the door - of having no door of one's own to walk through, for she was once a street-child herself, alone on the streets of Dublin. When she told the story of her early life in her bestselling autobiography Bridge Across My Sorrows she had no idea that it would prove a catalyst for so many others who had suffered childhood pain and rejection, or that it would inspire them to take the first courageous steps towards self-acceptance and their own self-healing. In 1989, driven by a dream and by the memory of her own past, she travelled 6,000 miles to Vietnam, a country of great beauty where war has left a terrible legacy. Against extraordinary odds she opened the Christina Noble Children's Foundation, a haven of food, beds, medical aid and schooling where the street children of Saigon can find safety and new beginnings under the protection of 'Mama Tina'. In this vivid and moving book Christina's compelling story continues with the amazing tale of what she and her Foundation have achieved. She takes us from the streets of Saigon to the Children's Prisons of Mongolia. A staunch campaigner for children's rights, for her there are no frontiers, only a world filled with children reaching out. Finally she returns to Dublin, where the former street orphan is officially and proudly greeted by the President of Ireland herself.

Tina Swithin was swept off her feet by a modern day Prince Charming and married him one year later. Tina soon discovered that there was something seriously wrong with her fairytale. The marriage was filled with lies, deception, fraud and many tears. Tina was left in an utter state of confusion. This wasn't the man that she married...or was it? Tina first heard the term, Narcissistic Personality Disorder from her therapist in 2008 but quickly dismissed the notion that something could be wrong with her husband. It took several years for Tina to begin researching the disorder and suddenly, the past ten years of her life made complete sense. Tina soon discovered that there is only one thing more difficult than being married to a narcissist and that is divorcing a narcissist. In her book, Tina will explain how a smart, independent woman can fall prey to a narcissistic man. Tina discusses the red flag reflections that she chose to ignore while dating and during the marriage. Tina acted as her own attorney in an extremely high-conflict divorce and she will share the strategies that helped her to navigate through this battle while maintaining her sanity and sense of humor. Tina will help you to feel less alone in your journey and will assure you that there is light at the end of the tunnel no matter how dark things are right now. While Tina endured a tumultuous 6-year custody battle, she prevailed and today, her daughters have peace.

The Story of the Lost Child is the long-awaited fourth volume in the Neapolitan novels (My Brilliant Friend, The Story of a New Name, Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay). The quartet traces the friendship between Elena and Lila, from their childhood in a poor neighbourhood in Naples, to their thirties, when both women are mothers but each has chosen a different path. Their lives are still inextricably linked, for better or worse, especially when it comes to the drama of a lost child. Elena Ferrante was born in Naples. She is the author of seven novels: The Days of Abandonment, Troubling Love, The Lost Daughter, and the quartet of Neapolitan novels: My Brilliant Friend, The Story of a New Name, Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay, and The Story of the Lost Child. Frantugmalia, a selection of interviews, letters and occasional writings by Ferrante, will be published in 2016. She is one of Italy’s most acclaimed authors. Ann Goldstein has translated all of Elena Ferrante’s work. She is an editor at the New Yorker and a recipient of the PEN Renato Poggioli Translation Prize. Praise for Ferrante and the Neapolitan novels ‘[Ferrante’s] charting of the rivalries and sheer inscrutability of female friendship is raw. This is high stakes, subversive literature.’ Sunday Telegraph ‘Ferrante is an expert above all at the rhythm of plotting...Whether it’s work, family, friends or sex–and Ferrante, perhaps thanks to her anonymity as an author, is blisteringly good on bad sex–our greatest mistakes in life aren’t isolated acts; we rehearse them over and over until we get them as badly wrong as we can.’ Independent ‘Great novels are intelligent far beyond the powers of any character or writer or individual reader, as are great friendships, in their way. These wonderful books sit at the heart of that mystery, with the warmth and power of both.’ Harper’s ‘Elena Ferrante is one of the great novelists of our time. Her voice is passionate, her view sweeping and her gaze basilisk...In these bold, gorgeous, relentless novels, Ferrante traces the deep connections between the political and the domestic. This is a new version of the way we live now—one we need, one told brilliantly, by a woman.’ New York Times Sunday Book Review ‘When I read [the Neapolitan novels] I find that I never want to stop. I feel vexed by the obstacles—my job, or acquaintances on the subway—that threaten to keep me apart from the books. I mourn separations (a year until the next one—how?). I am propelled by a ravenous will to keep going.’ New Yorker ‘The best thing I’ve read this year, far and away...She puts most other writing at the moment in the shade. She’s marvellous.’ Richard Flanagan ‘The Neapolitan series stands as a testament to the ability of great literature to challenge, flummox, enrage and excite as it entertains.’ Sydney Morning Herald ‘The depth of perception Ms. Ferrante shows about her character’s conflicts and psychological states is astonishing...Her novels ring so true and are written with such empathy that they sound confessional.’ Wall Street Journal ‘The older you get, the harder it is to recapture the intoxicating sense of discovery that comes when you first read George Eliot, Nabokov, Tolstoy or Colette. But this year it came again when I read Elena Ferrante’s remarkable Neapolitan novels.’ Jane Shilling, New Statesman ‘There is nothing remotely tiring or trying about the experience of reading the Neapolitan novels, which I, and a great many others, now rank among our greatest book-related pleasures...it is writing that holds honesty dear.’ Weekend Australian ‘Dickens gave working people a voice. Ferrante, whoever she might be, presents a new paradigm for being female in the world...Ferrante’s great literary creations, Lenu and Lila, have the same emotional weight as Anne in Persuasion, Jo in Little Women, Maggie in The Mill on the Floss, Jane in Jane Eyre.’ Helen Elliott in the Monthly ‘This stunning conclusion further solidifies the Neapolitan novels as Ferrante’s masterpiece and guarantees that this reclusive author will remain far from obscure for years to come.’ Publishers Weekly ‘The Neapolitan novels are smart, thoughtful, serious literature. At the same time, they are violent, suspenseful soap operas populated with a vivid cast of scheming characters...Ferrante’s novels are deeply personal and intimate, getting to the very heart of what it means to be a woman, a friend, a daughter, a mother.’ Debrief Daily ‘Shattering and enthralling, intimate and vicious...The Neapolitan Novels are the kind of books that swallow me whole. As soon as I pick one up, I don’t want to breathe or move lest I break the spell...The Neapolitan Novels are among the most important in my reading life. I can’t recommend them highly enough.’ Readings ‘Ferrante captures the complexities of women, friendship and motherhood in ways that make your heart soar and ache in equal measures. If you haven’t already, treat yourself to this series.’ ELLE Australia ‘[Ferrante’s] Neapolitan novels contain real life – recognisable anxiety, joy, love and heartbreak. This is an incredibly difficult feat to achieve in the first place, let alone sustain, over four books. We will be talking about Elena and Lila for years to come.’ Sydney Morning Herald ‘There's a bright, sinewy humanness to Ferrante’s writing that is so alive it's alarming...The Story of the Lost Child is a full emotional experience, and a fitting end to a huge, arresting series.’ New Zealand Listener ‘I was one of the many who wept and wondered over Elena Ferrante’s The Story of the Lost Child. I plan to re-read the entire series soon.’ Favourite Feminist Reads from 2016, Feminist Writers Festival

For three hundred years the travelling actors of Litonya roamed the land entertaining crowds, but secretly leaving devastation in their wake. Is Mina the only person with the power to stop them? In the ethereal otherworld of Tarya, Mina begins to master the rare, inexplicable powers attached to her gift for storytelling. She discovers she can touch dreams, influence the real world, and perhaps find out who is manipulating Tarya for dark purposes. In the waking world Mina is on the run, beset by divided loyalties between the travellers, and caught between two men she could love and a brother who desperately needs her help.

This book is about the childhood experiences of a Native American girl from a small East Coast Community.

When fifteen-year-old Christina Eudora Von Scholl learns that her family will leave their German homeland to seek freedom in Texas, her greatest sorrow is leaving behind her beloved grandmother. And so, in a series of letters, she takes “Oma” on this great adventure with her family . . . and takes us as readers. Sometimes the letters are dark with discouragement, for the Von Scholls find, as did many German-Texas families, that the Society for the Protection of German Emigrants, known as the Adelsverein, was unable to fulfill its promises of land, housing, horses, and farm implements. But they are Germans, determined and willing to work hard. More often these letters—and the text woven in between them—are bright with adventure, for Tina finds Texas an exciting, if puzzling, place. There are new customs to learn, new foods to eat, even while the family preserves its traditional German ways. Tina’s adventures include a run-in with a mountain lion, an exciting trip across Texas with her father to Sisterdale, and a frightening encounter with Lipan Indians. Her lessons in being an American are helped by Jeff, a young man who becomes part of the family when he undertakes to teach them to farm in Texas. Tina, in return, teaches Jeff to read and learns a lesson in love that is without nationality. Letters to Oma is a charming, informative novel that sweeps the reader back to a very particular time and place. And Tina Von Scholl is irresistible as correspondent and as heroine.

Madam Nancy Mae Webster is a successful black nightclub and restaurant owner during the 50s and 60s Jim-Crow South. Due to her heroin addiction and a heroin overdose her lifes story becomes the body of the story as it is told by the conscious of her incarcerated son, while he waits to see her in the waiting room at the hospital. Her white-like skin and her sons very black complexion complicate everything. The great differences in their complexions are the results of her being raped and left for dead by two black men when she is an innocent young farm girl in West Tennessee. The son, Joel Webster, is the hopeful protagonist of his own story, while he is the despised antagonist in the story of his mothers trouble-ridden life. The two dramatic tales have him as a convict visiting the hospital to see his dying mother, while guarded by two sets of alternating prison guards one good and the other one bad. He tries to escape from his own impending death from jailhouse hit men because he witnesses two guards beating a black inmate to death in his jail cell and they want him dead where he can't testify against them. His and his mothers world are split in two black and white worlds that create tension and friction between family members. There are the two uncles Tom and Pete that add suspense to his every thought as he recalls his dying mothers life from her innocent childhood to her reprehensible demise at forty-one years old. Joel Webster is born into a life of rejection, hatred, and violence because of his black skin and being the son of one of the two black men that raped his mother and his uncles had killed for doing it. After much painful recalling a beautiful black woman that looks white, and his mothers double life as she passes for white in a bigoted society, and the rich white man that she loves and he loves her, he meets Bobby Lucky. He tells a different side of Nancys life and his own life and his wife is ready to kick him out and his mother threatens to disinherit him from the familys fortune if he doesnt dump his Negro mistress. He repents and begs Joel for forgiveness for separating him from his mother when he is younger. He befriends Joel and works to help him get out of jail. He tells Joel everything that has happened to Nancy in the white world where she lives in a fine mansion with her heroin addiction and her servants that she struggles to conceal her true identity from while he is in reform school and jail. Joel is arrested for a robbery that he doesnt commit. Joels life story is told in the present time of the early 70s when the civil-right struggles are in full-bloom and hes in the protests. Drugs and riotous living invade the black community like a wave of cold air and he sees the devastating effects of it in many of those around him. Nancys best friend, Helen Bond, sheds many tears while Bobby Lucky tells of Nancys heroin addiction and her betrayal. Nancy only wants to become a schoolteacher and have a family but life gives her everything but what she wants. She befriends the wrong person and it destroys her. Helen Bond serves her heroin when she is at her lowest point or what she thinks is her lowest point until the heroin hooks her. Her grandma Tina has long been dead but her pain goes deep into her grave. Her black son is a paradox in her life and he is the only link to her true identity in her white-world existence and she evades him at a great cost to both of their lives. She doesnt want to work as a five-dollar-per-day maid any longer and she takes a job in a house of prostitution as a recruiter. She is soon able to give her son everything he wants but her love and he goes to the reform school to escape his torment on the streets from everyone that knows him because of what his mother does for a living. She meets and old acquaintance who is rich and white and madly in love with her. He takes her out of the whorehouse and sets her up with a nightclub and restaurant. Still her jealous fr