Etiquette for the End of the World

?In Dreamer?s Island Gretchen Hummel has created a rich, complex world that?s both beautiful and scary. Reading it, I found myself caught up in a lively and humorous community of artists, craftspeople, and dreamers-who are all too aware of the dangers that menace them from outside. I couldn?t put it down.?
--Alison Baker, winner of three O. Henry Awards and author of Loving Wanda Beaver

In a post-plague, baby-hungry world Blair searches for her kidnapped daughter. She works as a tour guide on what mainlanders call Devil?s Island-all that?s left of a future San Francisco. The island is infamous for its high rate of plague survivors, its lively, thriving arts community, and its suspect spirituality.

Islanders are fascinated by mysterious ?plague-gifts? - knowledge and skills acquired by surviving the plague and are covertly experimenting with the virus. Mainlanders abhor the mere mention of anything plague-related.

The island is quarantined, yet mainlanders Dr. Lourdes and his daughters insist on a visit. Their stated agenda is to shop the arts district and to adopt a child. But Dr. Lourdes?s curiosity about rumored plague virus experiments has Blair worried about the true purpose of their visit.

When the doctor?s youngest daughter contracts the plague, Blair must call on all her plague-gifts to help her survive. The girl?s fight for her life and Blair?s search for her own daughter dovetail in a startling conclusion that is beyond Blair?s wildest dreams.

SHADES OF GRAY-INTO THE LIGHT is a journey. A collection of stories told in poetic verse and prose of the layers of the human spirit. Stories of life and love and joys and sorrows chronicled by dates in random order taken from events in life.

Stories of fact and fiction beginning in DARK SHADES before migrating through the MEDIUM SHADES of life into the eventuality of LIGHT SHADES where hope always springs eternal when willing souls refuse to give into anything less than they deserve. SHADES of GRAY-INTO THE LIGHT is a story of change! A story of  facing challenges head on that we sometimes create ourselves as life hands them to us allowing us to make the choices that dictate where our lives will go. 

We stand on the threshfold of change where hopes rewards are but a few steps away as long as we dare to dream!

When half-Korean sci fi-fantasy gamer nerd Cyrus Gae goes out clubbing on his first night of vacation, hes not expecting to be bitten by a vampire. Not in Florida, the land of sunshine and Mickey Mouse. Hes not exactly averse to being a creature of the night, but hes righteously pissed off about the vampires cavalier eat-and-run attitude. Determined to track down Troy, the bloodsucker who turned him, Cyrus takes the name Vlad and begins a search that will take him to leather bars, vampire dens, and cyber cafés.

As Cyrus hunts the elusive vampire, he meets Logon, the hipster/geek love of his afterlife; Vinnie, his Girl Friday the 13th; and even an intersexual voodoo queen, while learning that being a supernatural bad-ass isnt quite what he imagined. In fact, hardly anything is what it seems, and Vlad finds himself in the middle of an intrigue involving Floridas master vampirewho isnt thrilled about Vlads sudden appearance in his domain. With powerful forces aligning against Vlad, hell have no choice but to become the hero he never wanted to be if he wants to keep his beloved Logon safe.

Throughout his quest, Andy will learn more about himself as he goes through all the exquisite emotion that is love to its pinnacle (joy and happiness) and to its lowest point (heart break and loss) as he ponders on his life and wonders if it's worth it?

Join Andy in his journey as his adventures takes him from San Francisco to Palm Springs and to Los Angeles for the ultimate prize - love.

Like Meg Cabot, Sarah Strohmeyer has a gift for creating smart, funny girls teen readers love. She’s done it again with Zoe, heroine of her latest romcom.
 
In YA novel How Zoe Made Her Dreams (Mostly) Come True, Zoe learns there is a dark core under the glittering façade of the fairy-tale themed amusement park (cough, Disneyland, cough) where she’s a summer intern. For starters, her boss has a blacker heart than Snow White’s stepmother, and the other interns are worse backstabbers than Cinderella’s step-sisters.
 
On the upside, she has the chance of romance with a real-life Prince Charming, and a shot at winning a big heap of cash. If she can just live through a summer in the Fairyland Kingdom.