This is fun, self-published Oz fan-fiction by awarded Oz author Ron Baxley, Jr. who wrote this fan-fic as after-thoughts or "After-Th'Oz" to his more established Oz and Oz/Wonderland works from Maple Creek Press. It includes a brand new Oz/Wonderland novella based on Ron's and James C. Wallace II's Of Cabbages/Oz/Wonderland series, three brand new short stories that take place after Ron's _The Oz Omnibus of Talking City Tales_ (Maple Creek Press 2014), one bonus of a non-fiction article on some Munchkin actors from Ron's home-town, and a super hero story based on them. It includes public domain images from classic Wonderland and Oz illustrators. Ron decided he should no longer have Oz as solely an after-thought. Perhaps his readership should too.
Ziggy Zig-Zags The Light and Dark Fantastic is a graphic fantasy novel written by Ron Baxley, Jr., with illustrations by Vincent Myrand and lettering by Ali Tavakoly. Few people know, in this day and age, the epic history of the Pembroke Welsh Corgi breed. These stalwart and intelligent big dogs in small bodies were used as battle steeds for elvish warriors. But their utility was not restricted to times of war. Elves and other small magical creatures found the Corgis to be the perfect partners for everyday tasks and journeys. Some say that the white markings Welsh Pembroke Corgis bear to this day are the places where the elvish saddles and stirrups left their marks. Ziggy is such a Pembroke Welsh Corgi; one who was entrusted by the elves with some vital and important missions. The first was to rescue a Lost Boy from Neverland. Armed with pixie dust carefully packaged by the elves, and with his inimitable buoyancy and good cheer, Ziggy followed the star signs and landed in Neverland, where he found Tiddle, the lost boy who was now found.
In a world where the sun is frozen and the moon burns, an unlikely hero rises to free the Earth Mother from her chains. His path lies in shadows, his enemies' legion.
Seventeen-year-old Keri likes to plan for every possibility. She knows what to do if you break an arm, or get caught in an earthquake or fire. But she wasn't prepared for her brother's suicide, and his death has left her shattered with grief. When her childhood friend Janna tells her it was murder, not suicide, Keri wants to believe her. After all, Janna's brother died under similar circumstances years ago, and Janna insists a visiting tourist, Sione, who also lost a brother to apparent suicide that year, has helped her find some answers. As the three dig deeper, disturbing facts begin to pile up: one boy killed every year; all older brothers; all had spent New Year's Eve in the idyllic town of Summerton. But when their search for the serial killer takes an unexpected turn, suspicion is cast on those they trust the most. As secrets shatter around them, can they save the next victim? Or will they become victims themselves?
The Yookoohoo Grandma Natch is throwing a party that Button-Bright and Ojo won't soon forget. All of Oz's oddest Yookoohoos are coming! But who is the mysterious stranger and what is the bizarre gift that he brings? Soon, the the boys are off on a perilous journey through the Gillikin Country, where along the way they'll discover hidden truths about the secretive Red Reera, giant spiders, and a mechanical monstrosity with a will of its own!
This groundbreaking classic is now available in a special anniversary edition with bonus content. Winner of the Newbery Medal as well as the National Book Award, HOLES is a New York Times bestseller and one of the strongest-selling middle-grade books to ever hit shelves! Stanley Yelnats is under a curse. A curse that began with his no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather and has since followed generations of Yelnatses. Now Stanley has been unjustly sent to a boys' detention center, Camp Green Lake, where the boys build character by spending all day, every day digging holes exactly five feet wide and five feet deep. There is no lake at Camp Green Lake. But there are an awful lot of holes. It doesn't take long for Stanley to realize there's more than character improvement going on at Camp Green Lake. The boys are digging holes because the warden is looking for something. But what could be buried under a dried-up lake? Stanley tries to dig up the truth in this inventive and darkly humorous tale of crime and punishment —and redemption. Special anniversary edition bonus content includes: A New Note From the Author!; "Ten Things You May Not Know About HOLES" by Louis Sachar; and more!
One of The Telegraph's Best Music Books 2011 We live in a pop age gone loco for retro and crazy for commemoration. Band re-formations and reunion tours, expanded reissues of classic albums and outtake-crammed box sets, remakes and sequels, tribute albums and mash-ups . . . But what happens when we run out of past? Are we heading toward a sort of culturalecological catastrophe where the archival stream of pop history has been exhausted? Simon Reynolds, one of the finest music writers of his generation, argues that we have indeed reached a tipping point, and that although earlier eras had their own obsessions with antiquity—the Renaissance with its admiration for Roman and Greek classicism, the Gothic movement's invocations of medievalism—never has there been a society so obsessed with the cultural artifacts of its own immediate past. Retromania is the first book to examine the retro industry and ask the question: Is this retromania a death knell for any originality and distinctiveness of our own?
By the New York Times bestselling author of The Bone Clocks and Cloud Atlas | Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize Selected by Time as One of the Ten Best Books of the Year | A New York Times Notable Book | Named One of the Best Books of the Year by The Washington Post Book World, The Christian Science Monitor, Rocky Mountain News, and Kirkus Reviews | A Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist | Winner of the ALA Alex Award | Finalist for the Costa Novel Award From award-winning writer David Mitchell comes a sinewy, meditative novel of boyhood on the cusp of adulthood and the old on the cusp of the new. Black Swan Green tracks a single year in what is, for thirteen-year-old Jason Taylor, the sleepiest village in muddiest Worcestershire in a dying Cold War England, 1982. But the thirteen chapters, each a short story in its own right, create an exquisitely observed world that is anything but sleepy. A world of Kissingeresque realpolitik enacted in boys’ games on a frozen lake; of “nightcreeping” through the summer backyards of strangers; of the tabloid-fueled thrills of the Falklands War and its human toll; of the cruel, luscious Dawn Madden and her power-hungry boyfriend, Ross Wilcox; of a certain Madame Eva van Outryve de Crommelynck, an elderly bohemian emigré who is both more and less than she appears; of Jason’s search to replace his dead grandfather’s irreplaceable smashed watch before the crime is discovered; of first cigarettes, first kisses, first Duran Duran LPs, and first deaths; of Margaret Thatcher’s recession; of Gypsies camping in the woods and the hysteria they inspire; and, even closer to home, of a slow-motion divorce in four seasons. Pointed, funny, profound, left-field, elegiac, and painted with the stuff of life, Black Swan Green is David Mitchell’s subtlest and most effective achievement to date. Praise for Black Swan Green “[David Mitchell has created] one of the most endearing, smart, and funny young narrators ever to rise up from the pages of a novel. . . . The always fresh and brilliant writing will carry readers back to their own childhoods. . . . This enchanting novel makes us remember exactly what it was like.”—The Boston Globe “[David Mitchell is a] prodigiously daring and imaginative young writer. . . . As in the works of Thomas Pynchon and Herman Melville, one feels the roof of the narrative lifted off and oneself in thrall.”—Time
A funny and heartwarming middle-grade graphic novel adventure about friendship, defying expectations, and finding your place. Manu and her best friend, Josefina, live at a magical school for girls, and Manu is always getting into trouble. The headmistress believes that Manu has the potential to help people with her magic, but Manu would rather have fun than fall in line. One day, a prank goes seriously wrong, and Josefina gets angry and wishes for Manu's magic to disappear... and it does. Manu uses a dangerous spell to restore it, but it makes her magic too powerful and nearly impossible to control. Great power comes at a cost, and it may be a price that Manu isn't able to pay!
