Showing results by narrator "Laura Knight Keating" in All Categories

As if her parents' divorce and sister's departure for college weren't bad enough, 14-year-old Ricky Bloom has just been diagnosed with a life-changing chronic illness. Her days consist of cursing everyone out, skipping school - which has become a nightmare - daydreaming about her crush, Julio, and trying to keep her parents from realizing just how bad things are. But she can't keep her ruse up forever.

The Hope Juvenile Treatment Center is ironically named. No one has hope for the delinquent teenagers who have been exiled there; the world barely acknowledges that they exist. Then the guards at Hope start acting strange. And one day...they don't show up. But when the teens band together to make a break from the facility, they encounter soldiers outside the gates.

Eight-year-old Maggie has a keen eye for noticing things in the Enchanted Forest that no one else does - like unicorns, griffins and...flying pigs! Maggie's newest chore at her friend Bob's stable is taking care of flying pigs - but they're not so easy to deal with! Maggie's used to putting up with a lot, though, like her stepmother, Zelia, who is trying to get Maggie's stepbrother, Peter, a job at the stable. Peter working with Maggie? Yeah, right! Maybe when pigs fly...

Eight-year-old Maggie has a keen eye for noticing things in the Enchanted Forest that no one else does - like tiny flying horses with wings. One day Maggie stumbles upon an injured flying horse. The only way to help the horse is to take it to a kindly stableman named Bob, who cares for magical animals. But in order to do so, Maggie must set out on a journey through the Enchanted Forest, which is full of dangers.

A terrible accident. A horrible loss. A regrettable tragedy. That's all anyone in Fenix can talk about when a fire consumes the local high school, taking the life of a student. The town mourns, except who really knew―let alone cared about―Eden when she was alive? And why was she in the building that night? Five teens each hold a piece of the truth about what happened. They also have their own secrets, secrets they will fight to protect with the same fury as the blaze that killed Eden. But silence is meant to be broken, and this story can't be extinguished…

Felicity Becker loves watching an event come together. There’s something magical about crafting an experience people will remember. So when her mom gets engaged, Felicity sees the wedding as the perfect opportunity to show off her skills. After Felicity’s friend Nancy offers up her family’s apple orchard as a venue, wedding planning gets even better. But the more time Felicity and Nancy spend together dress shopping and hunting for mismatched china, the more it starts to seem like there might be something besides friendship between them.

No one thought that MacTrump - Lord of MacTrump Towers, Son of New York - would ascend to the highest position in the kingdom. Yet with the help of his unhappy but dutiful wife Lady MacTrump, his clever daughter Dame Desdivanka, and his coterie of advisers, MacTrump is comfortably ensconced in the White Hold as President of the United Fiefdoms, free to make proclamations to his subjects through his favorite messenger, McTweet. The Democrati, mourning the loss of their cherished leader O'Bama, won't give up without a fight.

Beneath the streets of York, the goblin market calls to the Wickett women—the family of witches that tends to its victims. For generations, they have defended the old cobblestone streets with their magic. Knowing the dangers, they never entered the market—until May Wickett fell for a goblin girl, accepted her invitation, and became inextricably tied to the world her family tried to protect her from. The market learned her name, and even when she and her sister left York for Boston to escape it, the goblins remembered.

"No one gets something for nothing. We all should know better." Teenagers at Wisconsin's Nottawa High School are drawn deeper into a social networking site that promises to grant their every need...regardless of the consequences. Soon the site turns sinister, with simple pranks escalating to malicious crimes. The body count rises.

Poppy Pullman has her life all planned out. Her social media is carefully curated. Her list of extracurriculars is flawless. All so she can achieve her ultimate goal: Stanford. Her best friends say she’s missing out. But Poppy’s playing a long game. And the morning of her Stanford alumni interview, she’s positive everything is going to work out.

Miriam is the youngest, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t know things. She’s not as gullible as her parents or older siblings think, and she is too old for ridiculous stories that make no sense. So, using her superior detective skills, she sets out to debunk all of the fantastical things that people tell gullible kids. When her first tooth comes loose, Miriam is determined to prove to her friends and family that the tooth fairy isn’t real. She’s going to lay the perfect trap . . . just as soon as her tooth actually comes out.

Sidney and Asher should have clicked. Two star swimmers forced to spend their summers on a lake together sounds like the perfect match. But it's the same every year - in between cookouts and boat rides and family-imposed bonfires, Sidney and Asher spend the dog days of summer finding the ultimate ways to prank each other. And now, after their senior year, they're determined to make it the most epic summer yet.

A fifteen-year-old teenager is the backbone of her small Midwestern family, budgeting the household finances and raising her younger brother while her mom, a talented artist, weaves beautiful tapestries. For six years, it’s been just the three of them—her mom has brought home guests at times, but none have ever stayed. Yet when her mom brings home a six-foot tall crane with a menacing air, the girl is powerless to prevent her mom letting the intruder into her heart, and her children’s lives.

Thirty years ago, Grace’s mom left her hometown of Hermitage, Florida and never looked back—which is exactly why Grace thinks it’s the safest place to spend her summer now. Since her mom died in a car crash, Grace has been desperate to get away from the memories and reminders of her loss. Spending the summer transcribing cassette tapes for the Hermitage Historical Society might be boring, but boring is just what Grace needs. Until she hears the voice of Jake Underwood—the boy who first recorded the cassette tapes back in 1992.

Set in Shanghai and Seattle, Calculated is a gritty, modern day blend of The Count of Monte Cristo and Mission Impossible. She has many names - Octavia, Double 8, Phoenix, Josephine. She’s a math prodigy, a calculating genius, and everyone wants her. In 17-year-old Jo River’s complicated world of numbers, there’s no such thing as coincidence. When she is betrayed by someone she loves, kidnapped by the world’s most wanted smuggler, and forced to use her talent to shore up a criminal empire, Jo deems her gift a curse - until she meets Red.

Sixteen-year-old Virginia Shreves' life is finally back on course: She's accepted who she is inside and out and is rebuilding her relationship with brother Byron, whose date-rape charge shattered everything. But just as she adjusts to her new normal, her world turns upside down again. Sparks with boyfriend Froggy fade, her best friend bombshells bad news, and then the police arrest Byron.

In Tag’s world, children are disappearing. “Youngers” who venture Outside are windswept—vanishing in the swirling snow—Tag’s sisters among them. Many have tried to find the lost children; all have failed. And since the Other Times, the Powers That Be seem intent on keeping it that way. Little remains from those times: snippets of songs, heaps of plastic trash, and a few banned texts—including a book of fairytales.

Seventeen-year-old Evie Parker is devastated in the wake of her father’s sudden death. But she knows something her mother doesn’t: The day of his heart attack, her dad was planning to move out. After finding his packed bags, she impulsively put everything away to spare her mom more heartache. To make matters worse, Evie soon learns the reason her father was going to leave: He had been dating his 22-year-old receptionist, Bree, who is now six months pregnant with his child...Evie’s half-sibling.

For Annie's tenth birthday, her papa gives her a pad of paper, some colored pencils, and the Klimas family secret. It’s called the nuodeema burna, or eater of sins. Every time Annie does something wrong, she writes it down and sticks the paper in a hidden hole in the floor of their house. But Annie is quick to discover that her inheritance has a dark side.

Sometimes our feelings are so big, our dreams and our worries so wide, that we can’t find the words to express them. How MUCH love we feel; what a new sibling will bring; exactly what it’s like to take a hard tumble, or to want the sun to shine on a rainy day. These thoughts and questions are explored by Hans and Monique Hagen in poems pitched perfectly to the children who wonder.