A sixth grader stumbles upon a secret that threatens to turn school children everywhere into mindless automatons.

Ordinarily, no one would have imagined that Jack Rankin would vandalize a desk. But this was not an ordinary school year for Jack.... When Jack Rankin learns that he is going to spend the fifth grade in the old high school -- the building where his father works as a janitor -- he dreads the start of school. Jack manages to get through the first month without the kids catching on. Then comes the disastrous day when one of his classmates loses his lunch all over the floor. John the janitor is called in to clean up, and he does the unthinkable -- he turns to Jack with a big smile and says, "Hi, son." Jack performs an act of revenge and gets himself into a sticky situation. His punishment is to assist the janitor after school for three weeks. The work is tedious, not to mention humiliating. But there is one perk, janitors have access to keys, keys to secret places....

The Bureau of Educational Maintenance (BEM) is after Spencer, and the only place he is safe is within the walls of the New Forest Academy--or so he thinks.

Spencer, Daisy, and their team witness a Sweeper warlock eat Professor DeFleur whole and they must once again launch into a fight against evil.

This book exposes the underbelly of California's Silicon Valley, the most successful high-technology region in the world, in a vivid ethnographic study of Mexican immigrants employed in Silicon Valley's low-wage jobs. The author demonstrates how global forces have incorporated these workers as an integral part of the economy through subcontracting and other flexible labor practices and explores how these labor practices have in turn affected working conditions and workers' daily lives. These immigrants do not emerge merely as victims of a harsh economy; despite the obstacles they face, they are transforming labor and community politics, infusing new blood into labor unions, and challenging exclusionary notions of civic and political membership.

It had been well over a month since I had seen or heard from Dirk, and it was showing in my bank account...I was tempted to start searching for another job. I still had faith, though, that somehow, someway, I was meant for this line of work... "Hello?" I mumbled, not recognizing the number on the caller ID. "Jeff, it's Dirk," said the voice. I waited curiously, wondering who the hell Dirk was. "We've got one," he eventually said when I failed to answer. We had never bothered to get together for any sort of training, and now, it was too late. After toiling for minimum wage for years, Jeff Klima got an unexpected offer: to head up a brand new crime scene cleanup company in Orange County. The upside? A chance to make incredible money in a field with no competition. The downside? Everything else about the job. The Dead Janitors Club is an engrossing, hilarious, and morbidly fascinating memoir of life and death, from someone whose life is death. From his first job—where a piece of brain fell off the ceiling and landed in his eye—to having to clean up one of his former neighbors, The Dead Janitors Club is more than just a retelling of crime scenes and what it takes to clean them up. It is a memoir about struggling to survive college, love, life, and keeping one's sanity when one never knows if, the next time the phone rings, you must delve into the darker side of life and death.

"The Krakau came to Earth to invite humanity into a growing alliance of sentient species. But they hadn't counted on a mutated plague wiping out half the human population, turning the rest into shambling, near-unstoppable animals, and basically destroying human civilization. You know, your standard apocalypse. The Krakau's first impulse was to turn around and go home. (After all, it's hard to have diplomatic relations with mindless savages who eat your diplomats.) Their second impulse was to try to fix us. Now, a century later, human beings might not be what they once were, but at least they're no longer tryiying to eat everyone. Mostly."--Jacket flap.

Spencer and his team of Rebels must face the combined evil of the Founding Witches and the Sweepers, or the world is doomed to fall under the control of the sinister Bureau of Educational Maintenance.

For more than 20 years, Mike Garcia led the legendary Justice for Janitors movement in California, mobilizing thousands of immigrant workers to build one of the most powerful and dynamic unions in the country. The Justice for Janitors union conducted strikes that reverberated across the country, achieved path-breaking victories that transformed the way labor organizes, and moved political campaigns that won victories for millions of immigrant and low-wage workers across the country and shifted political power in California to the left. This book traces Mike Garcia's roots from a Mexican American, working-class family and captures his visionary leadership that transformed his union and the US labor movement.

Human civilization didn’t just fall. It was pushed. The Krakau came to Earth in the year 2104. By 2105, humanity had been reduced to shambling, feral monsters. In the Krakau’s defense, it was an accident, and a century later, they did come back and try to fix us. Sort of. It’s been four months since Marion “Mops” Adamopoulos learned the truth of that accident. Four months since she and her team of hygiene and sanitation specialists stole the EMCS Pufferfish and stopped a bioterrorism attack against the Krakau homeworld. Four months since she set out to find proof of what really happened on Earth all those years ago. Between trying to protect their secrets and fighting the xenocidal Prodryans, who’ve been escalating their war against everyone who isn’t Prodryan, the Krakau have their tentacles full. Mops’ mission changes when she learns of a secret Krakau laboratory on Earth. A small group under command of Fleet Admiral Belle-Bonne Sage is working to create a new weapon, one that could bring victory over the Prodryans … or drown the galaxy in chaos. To discover the truth, Mops and her rogue cleaning crew will have to do the one thing she fears most: return to Earth, a world overrun by feral apes, wild dogs, savage humans, and worse. (After all, the planet hasn’t been cleaned in a century and a half!) What Mops finds in the filthy ruins of humanity could change everything, assuming she survives long enough to share it. Perhaps humanity isn’t as dead as the galaxy thought.