Showing results by publisher "Blackstone Audio, Inc." in Difficult Situations

This stunning debut captures the grotesque madness of Underland, as well as a girl’s pangs of first love and independence. Alyssa Gardner hears the whispers of bugs and flowers - precisely the affliction that landed her mother in a mental hospital years before. This family curse stretches back to her ancestor Alice Liddell, the real-life inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Alyssa might be crazy, but she manages to keep it together. For now.

Isabelle Scott’s life may not be easy, but she loves it. She is a star swimmer and lifeguard, has great friends, and has been spending the summer with Brayden, a cute surfer—though they’re just friends. But her grandmother, with whom she’s lived since her mother died five years earlier, is declining quickly, and Izzie’s whole world is upended. She’s whisked away from the poor, rough neighborhood where she grew up to live with her aunt, uncle, and cousins in the exclusive Emerald Cove.

Isabelle Scott and Mirabelle Monroe are still reeling from the revelation that they share more than just the roof over their heads. The media has pounced on their story and the girls are caught up in a flurry of talk-show appearances and newspaper interviews. They’ve put on a happy public face, but someone is leaking their true feelings to the press. While it seems like the world is watching their every move, at least they have each other. But with cotillion season right around the corner, Izzie and Mira have barely had time to process their newfound sisterhood.

Seventeen-year-old Piper knows that Father is a Prophet. Infallible. The chosen one. She would do anything for Father. That's why she takes care of all her little sisters. That's why she runs end-of-the-world drills. That's why she never asks questions. Because Father knows best. Until the day he doesn't. Until the day the government raids the compound and separates Piper from her siblings, from Mother, from the Aunts, from all of Father's followers - even from Caspian, the boy she loves.

Third Sister in the Tao family, Ailin has watched her two older sisters go through the painful process of having their feet bound. In China in 1911, all the women of good families follow this ancient tradition. Ailin rebels and refuses to follow this torturous tradition. But as she enters adolescence, Ailin finds that her family is no longer willing to support her. With a bold conviction and an indomitable spirit, Ailin is determined to forge her own destiny. Her story is a tribute to all those women whose courage created new options for the generations who came after them.

Margaret and her best friend Elizabeth both have brothers fighting the war against Hitler and, like everyone else they know, they are filled with feelings of patriotism. But the girls are also involved in their own personal war at home. Gordy Smith, the worst bully in the sixth grade, teases and torments them, and Margaret is scared to death of him. But when Gordy and his pals Toad and Doug grow bolder than ever, Margaret and Elizabeth come up with a daring plan to get even. That’s when the girls discover a shocking secret about Gordy.

Since emigrating from Bangladesh, 14-year-old Nadira and her family have been living in New York City on expired visas, hoping to realize their dream of becoming legal U.S. citizens. But after 9/11, everything changes. Suddenly being Muslim means you are dangerous - a suspected terrorist. When Nadira's father is arrested and detained at the U.S.-Canadian border, Nadira and her older sister, Aisha, are told to carry on as if everything is the same. The teachers at Flushing High don't ask any questions, but Aisha falls apart....

Angie always thought high school romances were just silly infatuations that come and go. She certainly never thought she would fall in love over one short summer. But then she sees Jack Duluth’s crew cut peek out over a booth in McKnight’s drugstore, and their connection is beyond any childish crush. Suddenly, Angie and Jack are filling their summer with stolen moments and romantic nights. But as fall grows closer, they must figure out if their love is forever or just a summer they’ll never forget.

Music is Simon’s life - which is why he is devastated when a stroke destroys his hearing. He resists attempts to help him adjust to his new state, refusing to be counseled, refusing to learn sign language, refusing to have anything to do with Deaf culture. Refusing, that is, until he meets G, a tough-as-nails girl dealing with her own newly experienced deafness.

The Larkin family isn't just lucky - they persevere. At least that's what Violet and her younger brother, Sam, were always told. When the Lyric sank off the coast of Maine, their great-great-great grandmother didn't drown like the rest of the passengers. No, Fidelia swam to shore, fell in love, and founded Lyric, Maine. One beautiful summer day, brilliant, sensitive Sam attempts to take his own life. Shipped back to Lyric while Sam is in treatment and desperate to make amends, Violet embarks on a wildly ambitious mission: locate the Lyric.

In the exciting final installment of the Lost Voices trilogy, mermaid Luce swims to the San Francisco Bay where she finds a group of renegade mermaids who become an army under her leadership when war breaks out between humans and mermaids.

After parting ways with her troubled mermaid tribe, Luce just wants to live peacefully on her own. But her tranquility doesn’t last long: She receives news that the tribe is on the verge of collapse and desperately needs her leadership. The tribe’s cruel queen wants Luce dead. Dorian, the boy Luce broke mermaid law to save, is determined to make her pay for her part in the murder of his family. And while the mermaids cling to the idea that humans never suspect their existence, there are suddenly ominous signs to the contrary.

Fourteen-year-old Luce has had a tough life, but she reaches the depths of despair when she is assaulted and left on the cliffs outside a grim Alaskan fishing village. She expects to die when she tumbles into the icy waves below but instead undergoes an astonishing transformation: she becomes a mermaid. A tribe of mermaids finds Luce and welcomes her in. All of them, like her, are lost girls who surrendered their humanity in the darkest moments of their lives.

It's been several years since Carly Vega's parents were deported. Carly lives with her older brother, studies hard, and works the graveyard shift at a convenience store to earn enough to bring her parents back from Mexico.

Meg isn't thrilled when she gets stuck sharing a bedroom with her older sister Molly. The two of them couldn't be more different, and it's hard for Meg to hide her resentment of Molly's beauty and easy popularity. But now that the family has moved to a small house in the country, Meg has a lot to accept. Just as the sisters begin to adjust to their new home, Meg feels that Molly is starting up again by being a real nuisance. But Molly's constant grouchiness, changing appearance, and other complaints are not just part of a new mood.

It's been three months since Lane made her first kill - the sadistic Decapitator - and now she feels both closer and more alienated than ever from her united, grieving family. Haunted by conflicting memories of her mother, Lane resumes her role as the vigilante Masked Savior out of a feeling of obligation - but her heart just isn't in it anymore. Now that Lane has felt the rush of deeper, darker thrills, a growing part of her wants to revisit its seductive power, and she's not sure how long she can resist.

An intensely powerful account of a teen, bullied for herport-wine stain, who must summon her personal strength to survive abduction andhorrific abuse at the hands of a deranged killer

Sixteen-year-old Sarah Meadows longs for "normal."Born with a port-wine stain covering half her face, she has beenplagued by stares, giggles, bullying, and disgust all her life. But when she's abducted onthe way home from school, Sarah is forced to uncover the courage she never knewshe had, become a hero rather than a victim, and learn to look beyond her faceto find the beauty and strength she has inside. It's that - or succumb to akiller.

Summer in Sand Lake isn't complete without a trip to Meade Creamery - the local ice cream stand founded in 1944 by Molly Meade, who started making ice cream to cheer up her lovesick girlfriends while all the boys were away at war. Since then, the stand has been owned and managed exclusively by local girls, who inevitably become the best of friends.

Last night Sarah was a bridesmaid, dressed in a hideous mango chiffon. Today she wakes up dead at the Mall of America. This is where the universe sends teenagers who were murdered. In fact most malls are haunted. The living don't notice it, what with all the bright lights, sales, and free samples. The dead just pass through them while finishing up the business of their former lives.

Victoria Zell doesn't fit in, not that she cares what anyone thinks. She and her homeschooled boyfriend, Andrew, are inseparable. All they need is each other. That is, until Zachary Zimmerman joins her homeroom. Within an hour of meeting, he convinces good-girl Vic to cut class. And she can't get enough of that rush. Despite Vic's loyalty to Andrew, she finds her life slowly entwining with Z's. Soon she's lying to everyone she knows in an effort to unravel Z's secrets. Except Z's not the only one with a past.