When best friends, Cleo, Emma and Rikki find themselves accidentally stranded on a mysterious island something very strange happens. While swimming through an eerie underwater channel, the moon has a magical effect on the water changing the three girls forever. One by one the three friends discover that when they come into contact with water they grow a fishtail and become mermaids! Cleo, Emma and Rikki just want to be normal teenage girls and live normal lives, but as they start to come to terms with their new tails, not to mention their magical powers over H20, they begin to realise that they may never be normal again!
One of the Must-Read Books of 2019 According to O: The Oprah Magazine * Time * Bustle * Electric Literature * Publishers Weekly * The Millions * The Week * Good Housekeeping “There is more life packed on each page of Ordinary Girls than some lives hold in a lifetime.” —Julia Alvarez In this searing memoir, Jaquira Díaz writes fiercely and eloquently of her challenging girlhood and triumphant coming of age. While growing up in housing projects in Puerto Rico and Miami Beach, Díaz found herself caught between extremes. As her family split apart and her mother battled schizophrenia, she was supported by the love of her friends. As she longed for a family and home, her life was upended by violence. As she celebrated her Puerto Rican culture, she couldn’t find support for her burgeoning sexual identity. From her own struggles with depression and sexual assault to Puerto Rico’s history of colonialism, every page of Ordinary Girls vibrates with music and lyricism. Díaz writes with raw and refreshing honesty, triumphantly mapping a way out of despair toward love and hope to become her version of the girl she always wanted to be. Reminiscent of Tara Westover’s Educated, Kiese Laymon’s Heavy, Mary Karr’s The Liars’ Club, and Terese Marie Mailhot’s Heart Berries, Jaquira Díaz’s memoir provides a vivid portrait of a life lived in (and beyond) the borders of Puerto Rico and its complicated history—and reads as electrically as a novel.
No Ordinary Girl is about an Australian woman's ambition to achieve her greatest sporting dream. Her autobiography recaptures her journey from learning to swim through to receiving a silver paralympic medal in the presence of family and friends at the Sydney International Aquatic Centre. The story since the silver medal is of struggle and turmoil. Having enjoyed a successful career in the pool, Tamara's struggles with depression, anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder resulted in trialling numerous medications, ospitalisations and 22 electroconvulsive therapies. With mental illness sabotaging Tamara's success in the pool, the years following her retirement from an elite sporting career have seen an ongoing battle to overcome a life plagued by both physical disability and psychiatric disorders. No Ordinary Girl was written not only to inspire and encourage readers to strive towards their own personal goals and ambitions, but also to reduce the stigmatisation of mental health disorders and to demonstrate that they can strike anyone at anytime. Through this book the author hopes to increase awareness of the issues both mental health disorders and physical disability present to encourage positive community response and acceptance. This book provides a deep insight into the daily living challenges endured by a sufferer of both neurological and psychiatric illness. No Ordinary Girl hopes to promote understanding and empathy. It is simply told as it is.
A brilliant but reluctant new superheroine must use her quirky superpowers to save the world in this entertaining romance from A.M. Goldsher. Abbey Bynum never asked for her strange superpowers; she was born with them and man, does she hate them. Only a few family members and her ex-fiancé, the uptight government bureaucrat Murphy Napier, know her secret. But when supervillain Jon Carson appears on the scene under the guise of a brilliant new defence lawyer at her work, Abbey knows she must embrace her 'weird stuff' to have any chance of thwarting his plans for world domination. There's only one person who can assist her: Murphy. He's had a complete makeover since their split two years ago, but can he help Abbey triumph in her epic superbattle of good versus evil, winning back her trust and her heart in the process?
Ordinary Girl is legendary singer-songwriter Donna Summer's delightfully candid memoir about her journey from signing in a Boston church to her unexpected reign as the Queen of Disco, and the tragedy and spiritual rebirth that followed.
For fans of Grumpy Cat and Cats on Instagram there's a new cat in town—Bailey, No Ordinary Cat—of the Facebook name, is a special cat with a growing fan base, garnering over 2 million views on Ellen's Instagram and videos that have been shared by Good Morning America, ABC News, CBS News, and more. What makes Bailey more addictive than catnip? In addition to his adorable expressions and his hilarious, heartfelt antics, Bailey has a penchant for doing things that are characteristically uncatlike—things like taking bubble baths (and enjoying them), sitting attentively in a chair and being read to (for hours), getting a "pet"-icure, and his unending patience while co-raising his human siblings Abby and Hannah (yes, there is photographic evidence that Bailey helped with potty-training). If you have a cat you know how independent they are. Bailey, No Ordinary Cat celebrates the unique quirky spirit of this unforgettable feline through four-color photographs and captions from the voice of Bailey himself. Cat lovers will be delighted to peek into the life of their favorite celebrity cat with the huge eyes, huge heart, and huge personality—and an ever-growing following.
“The book's teenage protagonists and their bravery will enthrall young adults, who may find themselves inspired to take up their own causes.” —Washington Post An astonishing World War II story of a trio of fearless female resisters whose youth and innocence belied their extraordinary daring in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands. It also made them the underground’s most invaluable commodity. May 10, 1940. The Netherlands was swarming with Third Reich troops. In seven days it’s entirely occupied by Nazi Germany. Joining a small resistance cell in the Dutch city of Haarlem were three teenage girls: Hannie Schaft, and sisters Truus and Freddie Oversteegen who would soon band together to form a singular female underground squad. Smart, fiercely political, devoted solely to the cause, and “with nothing to lose but their own lives,” Hannie, Truus, and Freddie took terrifying direct action against Nazi targets. That included sheltering fleeing Jews, political dissidents, and Dutch resisters. They sabotaged bridges and railways, and donned disguises to lead children from probable internment in concentration camps to safehouses. They covertly transported weapons and set military facilities ablaze. And they carried out the assassinations of German soldiers and traitors–on public streets and in private traps–with the courage of veteran guerilla fighters and the cunning of seasoned spies. In telling this true story through the lens of a fearlessly unique trio of freedom fighters, Tim Brady offers a fascinating perspective of the Dutch resistance during the war. Of lives under threat; of how these courageous young women became involved in the underground; and of how their dedication evolved into dangerous, life-threatening missions on behalf of Dutch patriots–regardless of the consequences. Harrowing, emotional, and unforgettable, Three Ordinary Girls finally moves these three icons of resistance into the deserved forefront of world history.
Shortlisted for the SYRCA 2013 Diamond Willow Award, selected as an American Library Association 2012 Notable Children's Book, a Booklist Editors' Choice, nominated for the OLA Golden Oak Tree Award, and a finalist for the Ruth and Sylvia Schwartz Children's Book Awards: Young Adult/Middle Reader Award, the Governor General's Literary Awards: Children's Text and the Canadian Library Association Book of the Year for Children Award There's not much that upsets young Valli. Even though her days are spent picking coal and fighting with her cousins, life in the coal town of Jharia, India, is the only life she knows. The only sight that fills her with terror are the monsters who live on the other side of the train tracks -- the lepers. Valli and the other children throw stones at them. No matter how hard her life is, she tells herself, at least she will never be one of them. Then she discovers that she is not living with family after all, that her "aunt" was a stranger who was paid money to take Valli off her own family's hands. She decides to leave Jharia ... and so begins a series of adventures that takes her to Kolkata, the city of the gods. It's not so bad. Valli finds that she really doesn't need much to live. She can "borrow" the things she needs and then pass them on to people who need them more than she does. It helps that though her bare feet become raw wounds as she makes her way around the city, she somehow feels no pain. But when she happens to meet a doctor on the ghats by the river, Valli learns that she has leprosy. Despite being given a chance to receive medical care, she cannot bear the thought that she is one of those monsters she has always feared, and she flees, to an uncertain life on the street. Correlates to the Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.4.3 Describe in depth a character, setting, or event in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text (e.g., a character's thoughts, words, or actions). CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.5.3 Compare and contrast two or more characters, settings, or events in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text (e.g., how characters interact). CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.6.6 Explain how an author develops the point of view of the narrator or speaker in a text.
