Showing results by narrator "Kimberly Woods" in All Categories

Holly Kendrick’s husband is dead. Holly saw it all. In one violent moment, a hit-and-run accident turns Holly’s life upside down. Then a fixer for the high-powered guilty party approaches Holly with an offer she is in no position to refuse. Holly and her daughter, Savannah, will want for nothing, beginning with a luxury dream house - all for the price of their silence. But when their sudden appearance in privileged Calabasas, California, piques the curiosity of neighbors, the price becomes greater than they imagined.

Twelve-year-old Micay walks around her fifteenth-century Incan village shielding the scarred side of her face that inspired the cruel name Millay, or “Ugly One.” She escapes to her huaca rock, avoiding the villagers who shun her. Her world shifts dramatically when a stranger gives her a sorry-looking baby macaw. The bird becomes her dear companion on a journey that ultimately leads her to a new role as shaman in Machu Picchu’s Sacred Sun City. Told in an engaging storyteller’s voice, this is a stirring tale of a girl who finds her own strength.

Afice is the last of nine generations of women who have survived enslavement, sickness, and hunger. Alone at age seventeen, she sets out through the Louisiana swamps to follow the trail of her ancestors and hear their songs anew. On this journey, Afice must decide how to honor her ancestors while embracing her own future.

The New World has been meddled with. With the Skirmish over, Blair finds herself in the New World where things aren't as simple as they initially seem. The System has been meddled with, tainted to change the outcome of the planet's fate; introducing a new form of Apex predator. Heralds. The strongest of the Elite Monsters, capable of changing the environment and making their own territory. Heralds, they are the bringers of change, the prelude to something more, and Blair will have to defeat them to grow stronger and establish herself in the New World.

As the last child in a family of daughters, 17-year-old Janneke was raised to be the male heir. While her sisters were becoming wives and mothers, she was taught to hunt, track, and fight. On the day her village was burned to the ground, Janneke - as the only survivor - was taken captive by the malicious Lydian and eventually sent to work for his nephew Soren. When the Goblin King’s death ignites an ancient hunt for the next king, Soren senses an opportunity for her to finally fully accept the ways of the brutal Permafrost.

The New World continues to progress towards its fated owner and imminent end. The Heralds have begun to fall. Other Initiators are finishing the Continental Challenges of their respective continent, all while Blair continues on her path towards Essence discovery. A path that many tread on, but few succeed; a long and arduous one that can take years even with guidance.

How quickly the ground shifts beneath our feet. We make choices—in the face of love, or violence, or necessity—and the effects ripple outward. In these moving short stories, acclaimed authors examine the foundations of the past, uncovering the irreversible decisions and life-changing encounters that mark the turning point between before and after.

It’s bad enough that Hazel and Gray have defied the demands of Hazel’s foul stepfather. The Monster has forbidden their romance. Now they’ve awakened in the forest, phones dead, hours past curfew. But not far away is a grand estate in the middle of nowhere. The door is open. In this short story about choosing your own path, the fury of the Monster that awaits them back home may be nothing compared to what lies ahead.

Dylan Woods hasn’t seen her best friend, Langston, in years. After he moved to Los Angeles, he ghosted her. Then he became Legendary, the biggest teen R&B artist on the planet. For the most part, Dylan has moved on, with her sights set on Juilliard. But when her parents announce that Langston is coming for a short stay with them, the entire family is thrilled. Except for Dylan. The idea of sharing a house with music’s biggest bad boy makes her stomach churn.

With the death of Sunny’s mother, matriarch of the wealthy Behre family, Sunny’s once picture-perfect life is thrown into turmoil. Her mother had groomed her to be the family’s next leader, so Sunny is confused when the only instructions her mother leaves is a mysterious note: “Take care of Dom.”

Timbuktu, western Africa, 1706. Folashade, the fourteen-year-old daughter of a professor of linguistics, is sent south with her older sisters, Bibi and Adaeze, to endure the painful ceremony that a girl on the cusp of womanhood is expected to. In Djenné, on the banks of the Niger, the sisters’ fate and that of their fellow Bambara are changed forever when they’re kidnapped, marched toward grueling indignities on Gorée Island, and eventually hauled aboard an English slaver bound for the Americas.

Marlow Fin is as famous for her beauty and success as she is infamous for her past, some of which is a mystery even to her. Is the public ready for the truth? Is she? In 1995, young Isla Baek finds an abandoned six-year-old Marlow in the woods near the Baek family’s lakeside cabin. With little memory of where she came from or how she got there, Marlow is soon adopted by the Baeks into a seemingly idyllic Midwest life as Isla’s enigmatic new sister. But no one is prepared for how unnerving and disruptive Marlow’s presence will be over the years.

Anastasia Vila's family can turn into swans, but just once she'd like them to turn into responsible adults. After hundreds of years, they still cling to the blood feud with the Renard family. No one remembers how it started in the first place—but foxes and swans just don't get along. Vilas can only transform into their swan shape after they have fallen in love for the first time, but between balancing schoolwork, family obligations, and the escalating blood feud, Ana's got no time for love. The only thing keeping her sane is her best friend, Pierce Kent.

Fourteen-year-old Coco is Morty the Moose for the summer—the official mascot for her family’s business, Wonderland Adventure Park. Her first shift in the claustrophobic and stinky moose costume comes in the middle of a heatwave, and of course it’s when she emerges a sweaty mess that her manager introduces her to the new hire, Henry…the cutest boy Coco has ever seen.

Inside every loggerhead turtle is genius: the ability to find their first home, no matter how far away. Follow one, from her birth on a beach in Australia...to her trip across an ocean filled with sharks and seahorses and much more...to her rescue from a net by a fisherman, who names her Yoshi...to her rehabilitation at an aquarium...to her record-breaking swim across the Indian Ocean to the beach on which she hatched, to lay her eggs.

It wasn't Tillie's choice to leave Philadelphia. But after everything that happened junior year, her mom insisted the quiet suburb of Willow Creek was the perfect place to get a fresh start, to put the trauma and rumors behind them. Madison Frank is the perfect distraction. Beautiful, fun, and from the wealthy side of town, Madison is the kind of girl who has a pull stronger than gravity. She commands attention, even inspires obsession. And by the end of summer, Tillie's forgotten everything―everyone―she left in Philadelphia. Almost. Then Madison goes missing.

A pregnant, upper class nineteen-year-old Philadelphia Main Line debutante is confined, against her will, to a state mental hospital. She spends her pregnancy surrounded by the mentally challenged and the criminally insane. On April 19, 1964, she gives birth to a child, whom she is forced to give up for adoption. A loving middle-class couple adopts a month-old little girl from Catholic Charities.

Classic fables take on new meaning as five of today’s most original bestselling authors serve up some deliciously modern twists. New reflections on evil queens, charmless princes, and star-crossed lovers branch out in provocative and enchanting directions. Follow the path and see where it leads...

Nothing about Kess Pedrock’s life is normal. Not her home (she lives in her family’s Unnatural History Museum), not her interests (hunting for megafauna fossils and skeletons), and not her best friend (a talking demon’s head in a jar named Shrunken Jim).

Overachievement isn’t a bad word—for Berlin, it’s the goal. She’s securing excellent grades, planning her future, and working a part-time job at Pink Mountain Pizza, a legendary local business. Who says she needs a best friend by her side? Dropping out of high school wasn’t smart—but it was necessary for Cameron. Since his cousin Kiki’s disappearance, it’s hard enough to find the funny side of life, especially when the whole town has forgotten Kiki. To them, she’s just another missing Native girl.