Showing results by narrator "Cindy Kay" in Teen & Young Adult

Ying Yue believes in love. So when the royal matchmaker selects her to wed the crown prince, Ying hopes that love is exactly what awaits her. No matter that the royal family is notoriously reclusive, rarely leaving their walled palace-and no matter the rumors about the previous royal brides, who after their weddings, were supposedly never seen again. Ying knows that she was chosen for a reason. After all, why else would the matchmaker select her, out of all the girls in the kingdom?

The Gearbreakers struck a devastating blow against Godolia on Heavensday, but the cost of victory has been steep. Months later, the few rebels who’ve managed to escape the tyrannical empire’s bloody retribution have fled to the mountains, hunted by the last Zenith—Godolia’s only surviving leader. Eris has been held prisoner since the attack on the capital, which almost killed her. And she begins to wish it had when she discovers Sona—the girl she loves, the girl she would tear down cities for—also survived, only to be captured and corrupted by the Zenith.

A blood feud between two gangs runs the streets red, leaving the city in the grip of chaos. At its heart is 18-year-old Juliette Cai, a former flapper who has returned to assume her role as the proud heir of the Scarlet Gang - a network of criminals far above the law. Their only rivals in power are the White Flowers, who have fought the Scarlets for generations. And behind every move is their heir, Roma Montagov, Juliette's first love and first betrayal. But when gangsters on both sides show signs of instability culminating in clawing their own throats out, the people start to whisper.

The shadow of Godolia's tyrannical rule is spreading, aided by their giant mechanized weapons known as Windups. War and oppression are everyday constants for the people of the Badlands, who live under the thumb of their cruel Godolia overlords. Eris Shindanai is a Gearbreaker, a brash young rebel who specializes in taking down Windups from the inside. When one of her missions goes awry and she finds herself in a Godolia prison, Eris meets Sona Steelcrest, a cybernetically enhanced Windup pilot.

After sacrificing her relationship with Roma to protect him from the blood feud, Juliette has been a girl on the warpath. One wrong move, and her cousin will step into usurp her place as the Scarlet Gang's heir. The only way to save the boy she loves from the wrath of the Scarlets is to have him want her dead for murdering his best friend in cold blood. If Juliette were actually guilty of the crime Roma believes she committed, his rejection might sting less.

After the mysterious death of their best friend, Ella, Yuki, and Rory are the talk of their elite school, Grimrose Académie. The police ruled Ariane’s death as a suicide, but the trio is determined to find out what really happened. When Nani Eszes arrives as their newest roommate, it sets into motion a series of events that no one could have predicted. As the girls retrace their friend’s final days, they discover a dark secret about Grimrose - Ariane wasn’t the first dead girl. They soon learn that all the past murders are connected to ancient fairy-tale curses....

Nimh still holds on to her divinity, if only by a thread. In her final confrontation with Inshara, the woman determined to take her place and rule Nimh’s kingdom, both Nimh and her enemy were sent to the world above, in the cloudlands. Now North looks to the sky, left behind on the surface world. Desperate for a chance to join the girl he loves and save his world, North will stop at nothing to find a way back to his home in the sky-city of Ciel. Before it’s too late to save anyone.

What makes a country fall to a dictator? How are authoritarian leaders - strongmen - capable of killing millions acquire their power? How are they able to defeat the ideal of democracy? And what can we do to make sure it doesn't happen again? By profiling five of the most notoriously ruthless dictators in history - Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, and Saddam Hussein - Kenneth C. Davis seeks to answer these questions, examining the forces in these strongmen's personal lives and historical periods that shaped the leaders they'd become.

Sirscha Ashwyn comes from nothing, but she's intent on becoming something. After years of training to become the queen's next royal spy, her plans are derailed when shamans attack and kill her best friend, Saengo. And then Sirscha, somehow, restores Saengo to life. Unveiled as the first soulguide in living memory, Sirscha is summoned to the domain of the Spider King. For centuries, he has used his influence over the Dead Wood - an ancient forest possessed by souls - to enforce peace between the kingdoms.

Nani, Yuki, Ella, and Rory have discovered a curse that’s leaving a trail of dead bodies at Grimrose. But the four friends know nothing of its origins, or how to stop the cycle of doomed fates. And each girl harbors her own secret. One is learning why she was brought to the school. One struggles to keep her new and deadly power under control. One knows exactly how much time she has left. And one, trying to escape her dark destiny, will come even closer to fulfilling it.

Growing up in 1860s China, Tam Ling Fan has lived a life of comfort. Her father is wealthy enough to provide for his family but unconventional enough to spare Ling Fan from the debilitating foot-binding required of most well-off girls. But Ling Fan’s life is upended when her brother dies of influenza and their father is imprisoned under false accusations. Hoping to earn the money that will secure her father’s release, Ling Fan disguises herself as a boy and takes her brother’s contract to work for the Central Pacific Railroad Company in America.

The Soulless is free from his centuries-long imprisonment. Now, he lurks in the Dead Wood recovering his strength, while Sirscha and her allies journey east to the shaman empire of Nuvalyn. Everyone believes she is a soulguide - a savior - but Sirscha knows the truth. She’s a monster, a soulrender like the Soulless, and if anyone discovers the truth, she'll be executed. But there’s nothing Sirscha won’t risk to stop the shaman responsible for the rot that’s killing her best friend.

Annalie and Margaret are sisters who agree on only one thing: that they have nothing in common. Annalie is 17: sweet, content and looking forward to a summer of flirting with the most popular boy in school. Margaret is 19: ambitious, a warrior for social justice and desperate to forget her ex-boyfriend in New York City. When their family is the victim of a racial attack, Annalie tries to pretend it never happened—but Margaret wants to fight back. Suddenly their relationship—and all the ones around them—are hanging by a thread.

Sixteen-year-old Ruby Chan considers herself a modern, independent American girl. But when her secret relationship with a white boy implodes—and then is revealed to her very traditional Chinese parents—she's in a tough spot. Horrified that Ruby's reputation is at risk, her parents hire a matchmaker to find her a Chinese husband. Ruby is determined to foil their plans. But how?

Sirscha has returned to Evewyn, only to discover that everyone believes she killed the queen and that she’s the new king’s Shadow. These rumors have made people fear her, but it’s not the rumors that concern her—it’s finding out what the Soulless is going to do next so she can finally destroy him. Everyone might believe she’s a monster, but Sirscha knows who the real evil is, and she refuses to let him destroy their world.

Luckily for humanity, scientist Marie Curie applied her brilliant mind and indomitable spirit to expanding the frontiers of science, but what if she had instead drifted toward the darkness? At the cusp of between child- and adulthood, at the crossroads between science and superstition, a teen Marie Curie faces the factual and the fantastic in this fabulous collection of stories that inspire, delight, and ask the question: What if she had used her talents for diabolical purposes?