Friendship Fiction

The sun beats down on seventh-grader Joel and his best friend as they pedal up and down the hills outside of town. Before leaving home, Joel had solemnly promised his father - on his honor - they would only go to the state park. He didn't explain they were planning a daring climb on the sheer river bluffs there.

One late summer evening in the post-industrial town of East Gladness, Connecticut, nineteen-year-old Hai stands on the edge of a bridge in pelting rain, ready to jump, when he hears someone shout across the river. The voice belongs to Grazina, an elderly widow succumbing to dementia, who convinces him to take another path. Bereft and out of options, he quickly becomes her caretaker. Over the course of the year, the unlikely pair develops a life-altering bond, one built on empathy, spiritual reckoning, and heartbreak.

The fourth book in Spotlight's fun and delicious tween series is told from the perspective of Alexis, the most organized member of the Cupcake Club. Alexis likes everything to be exact and logical, but she's finding that when it comes to love, there's no room for logic!

In the last two years, English professor Ellen Tolliver has weathered heartache with grace - including an unwelcome divorce and losing her parents. In her more honest moments, Ellen might admit that she's sick of loss. On impulse, Ellen invites her ailing best friend, Lara, to spend the summer with her at the Delaware beach house she inherited from her parents. Lara can relax on the big front porch after chemo while Ellen readies the house for sale. But Lara has plans, too - she'd like to help Ellen discover who she is, or better yet, who she can still become.

Herobrine is rallying all the monsters of Minecraft to one server in hopes of eliminating Gameknight999 and his friends once and for all. They destroy every village they find, threatening to continue until the User-that-is-not-a-user surrenders. Gameknight has just two things: the Oracle's command to seek out the lost ocean monument and an impenetrable riddle: "Look to the lowliest and most insignificant of creatures, for that is where your salvation will lie."

Something weird is going on! Miss Suki is a famous children's book author - and she's coming to A.J.'s school! She lives in the rainforest and writes about endangered animals. But when her pet raptor gets loose in the classroom, it's the kids who are going to be endangered! Yikes!

Gooaal! Soccer fans everywhere will cheer on SpongeBob SquarePants and his friends in this funny soccer adventure.

Gameknight999, a real-life Minecraft user trapped inside the game he loves to play, and his friend Crafter have transported to a new server. Malacoda is the King of the Nether, a terrible ghast that wants to destroy all of Minecraft with his massive army of blazes, magma cubes, zombie pigmen, and wither skeletons. Knowing the lives of all those within Minecraft - as well as those in the physical world - are depending on them, Gameknight and Crafter will need to search the land to recruit an NPC army.

There's a new girl in town, and Mia tries to take her under her wing. But Olivia Allen is not so nice; as a matter of fact, she might be even meaner than Sydney Whitman! Mia's been saving for weeks to buy a new pair of shoes, but when Olivia asks to borrow money, Mia gives it to her - only to find out Olivia spends the cash on the exact same shoes Mia has been saving up for!

Nora Reid believes scientific laws control everything, even love. With her grandparents' epic first kiss story cemented in her brain, Nora develops a hypothesis she's determined to prove: for each person in the world, there is exactly one other person, and at first kiss, they'll experience an immediate and intense reaction. But after four years of zero-reaction kisses, she comes up with a new theory: maybe that pesky crush on her stunningly hot best friend Eli Costas is skewing her results.

When 12-year-old Cooper Vega moves for the third time in five years, he receives a state-of-the-art smartphone to help him stay in touch with old friends. He's had phones before, but this one is buggy and unpredictable. When a boy named Roderick Northrop communicates with him through the phone, Cooper realizes that his phone isn't buggy at all; the thing is haunted!

When Link Baxter and his family move in down the street, and Link joins Jake's class in school, Jake finds out right away that he's not just a bully--he's a Superbully! Link makes fun of Drake at every available opportunity and even gets Drake sent to the principle's office. What can Jake do to stop these attacks? Andrew Clements' tale is a great first chapter book for children, and its valuable lessons speak to anyone who has ever been targeted by a classmate.

Blaze and Starla discover a map that leads to a bouncing bull racetrack, and race through the desert to find it!

When the Mystery Writers of America bestowed a Special Edgar Award on Donald J. Sobol’s Encyclopedia Brown series, its reputation as a classic of children’s literature was assured. This fun read finds 10-year-old Leroy Brown (known to the people of his town as Encyclopedia Brown) honing his impressive detective skills.

What causes a perfectly rational, mature woman to lose herself in a perfectly irrational, immature relationship? For Cynthia Thomas, a single, thirty-something woman, it could be insecurity. It could be loneliness. It could be something deeper. Like a woman who has waded so far into the ocean she's lost sight of the shore, Cynthia fears she's gone too far with Victor. She fears she's wasted too many of her good years. She's no closer to becoming a wife and a mother, and as she approaches her 40th birthday, her regrets threaten to destroy her. Good for them. But when will things be good for ...

Felix Allsey is a travel writer with a keen eye for the paranormal, and he's carved out a unique, if only slightly lucrative, niche for himself in nonfiction; he writes travelogues of the country's most haunted places, after haunting them himself. When he convinces the owner of the infamous Rotterdam Mansion to let him stay on the premises for two weeks, he believes he's finally found the location that will bring him a best seller. Then things start going wrong: screams from upstairs, figures in the thresholds, and more than what should be in any basement.

A massive zombies-versus-skeletons war has broken out in Minecraft, threatening to engulf and destroy the entire Overworld, and there's only one furry creature clever enough to stop it. Always a great teacher of crafting, as the conflict breaks out Bacca is tutoring his first zombie student - a young crafter named Dug - and decides to take his pupil with him on this important quest. Together they discover that the skeletons have stolen an ancient sword from the zombies that has a powerful prophecy surrounding it.

This first novel from Nebula Award-winning short story writer Ellen Klages was picked as a Junior Library Guild selection and named a Book Sense Number-One Children's Pick. It follows a young girl named Dewey, whose father is part of a super-secret project in 1943 Los Alamos. Dewey, a gifted scientist herself, slowly realizes the implications of "the gadget" her father is working on. She and Suze, another Los Alamos child, find comfort in each other's friendship.

It's July 1921, "flickers" are all the rage, and Irene Van Beck has just declared her own independence by jumping off a moving train to escape her fate in a traveling burlesque show. When her friends, fellow dancer Millie Martin and comedian Henry Weiss, leap after her, the trio finds their way to the bright lights of Hollywood with hopes of making it big in the burgeoning silent film industry. But despite the glamour and seduction of Tinseltown, success doesn't come easy, and nothing can prepare Irene, Millie, and Henry for the poverty, temptation, and heartbreak that lie ahead.

Sarah has now watched all her friends get their happily ever afters. But she's still grieving over Max, while trying to raise Julia and find the time to make hers and Ava's winery, Sava, a rousing success. It's the fall, a time of harvesting grapes and processing wine and booking major events. It's also a time for reflection. Sarah, unlike her friends and sister, has no desire for a relationship. That is until she meet Silas Pierce, an art dealer and artist who's a part of Conrad and Morgan's art cooperative. She and Silas have so much in common - both are worldly, interested in art and ...