A new edition of the raw and heartbreaking YA debut about one gay teen’s sacrifice and the community that can’t come to terms with the way he lived. Sixteen-year-old Joel Espen died of thirst and heat exhaustion while on a hike in the Grand Canyon. He collapsed in a desperate attempt to get water for his friend. In the aftermath, everyone said was the strongest, bravest, and kindest young man anyone knew. But nobody really knew him. The novel tells the story of Joel’s life and death through the memories of those who grew up around Joel. As each character presents a piece of the boy they knew, it becomes clear that however much people loved and admired Joel, there was something about him they could never quite admit—could never bring themselves to see. The heartbreaking tragedy was not only Joel’s death, but that in his life the people who loved him most, couldn’t accept him for what he was. The Way He Lived is an unsparing story of a teen’s life and death and legacy in a small community told with nuance and subtlety. “Powerful, funny, beautiful, and infinitely real. I love this book.”—Sara Zarr, National Book Award Finalist “Compassionate and heartfelt.” —Ellen Wittlinger, Michael L. Printz Award Honoree Winner of the 2009 Utah Book Award

Girl in Pieces meets The Way I Used to Be in this poignant and thought-provoking novel about a girl who must overcome her survivor's guilt after a fellow classmate is brutally murdered. I was one of five. The five girls Kyle texted that day. The girls it could have been. Only Jamie--beautiful, saintly Jamie--was kind enough to respond. And it got her killed. On the eve of Kyle's sentencing a year after Jamie's death, all the other "chosen ones" are coping in various ways. But our tenacious narrator is full of anger, stuck somewhere between the horrifying past and the unknown future as she tries to piece together why she gets to live, while Jamie is dead. Now she finds herself drawn to Charlie, Jamie's boyfriend--knowing all the while that their relationship will always be haunted by what-ifs and why-nots. Is hope possible in the face of such violence? Is forgiveness? How do you go on living when you know it could have been you instead?

A collection of reminiscences, stories, and songs that reflect the diversity of the people native to California.

This book documents the physical aspects of the lives of Hungarian Jews in the late 19th and early 20th centuries: the way they looked, the kind of neighborhoods and apartments they lived in, and the places where they worked. The many historical photographs—there is at least one picture per page—and related text offers a virtual cross section of Hungarian society, a diverse group of the poor, the middle-class, and the wealthy. Regardless of whether they lived integrated within the majority society or in separate communities, whether they were assimilated Jews or Hasidim, they were an important and integral part of the nation. We have surprisingly few detailed accounts of their lifestyles—the world knows more about the circumstances of their deaths than about the way they lived. Much like piecing together an ancient sculpture from tiny shards found in an excavation, Koerner tries to reconstruct the many diverse lifestyles using fragmentary information and surviving photos.

From the Man Booker Prize-nominated author of Sleeping on Jupiter and “one of India’s greatest living authors” (O, The Oprah Magazine), a poignant and sweeping novel set in India during World War II and the present day about a son’s quest to uncover the truth about his mother. In my childhood, I was known as the boy whose mother had run off with an Englishman. The man was in fact German, but in small‑town India in those days, all white foreigners were largely thought of as British. So begins the “gracefully wrought” (Kirkus Reviews) story of Myshkin and his mother, Gayatri, who rebels against tradition to follow her artist’s instinct for freedom. Freedom of a different kind is in the air across India. The fight against British rule is reaching a critical turn. The Nazis have come to power in Germany. At this point of crisis, two strangers arrive in Gayatri’s town, opening up to her the vision of other possible lives. What took Myshkin’s mother from India and Dutch-held Bali in the 1930s, ripping a knife through his comfortingly familiar universe? Excavating the roots of the world in which he was abandoned, Myshkin comes to understand the connections between the anguish at home and a war‑torn universe overtaken by patriotism. Evocative and moving, “this mesmerizing exploration of the darker consequences of freedom, love, and loyalty is an astonishing display of Roy’s literary prowess” (Publishers Weekly).

Pi�ata of poems. The Oxford English Dictionary's definition of the word "pi�ata" is illuminating and in accordance with the author's intentions in "Aloha Mahalo": "A decorated figure of an animal containing toys and sweets that is suspended from a height and broken open by blindfolded children as part of a celebration."