Last Sam's Cage is the remarkable story of fifteen-year-old Eddie Slater. Already labelled a young offender, Eddie runs away from an abusive stepfather and takes up residence at the Calgary Zoo. There he meets Jack, a middle-aged man who has been coming to the zoo's playground every day for thirty-two years to watch the children. Convinced that Jack is either a pervert or just plain weird, Eddie follows him home one day, and eventually breaks into his house to see what he can find. He discovers more than he bargained for - and that discovery changes both Eddie and Jack for good.

These are two works of fiction that have a common statement, mainly that the human experience and the anomaly of life itself exists for a purpose, to discover God. The first story, The Red and the Green, takes a wild trip into the future where men and women are separated by a type of cosmic divorce. There are two gods that have created the human race and they are represented by the opposite colors: red and green. The author is summoned to this era through the touching of a fern and it is his duty to create a painting that will liberate one of the diseased gods. The second story, The Last Tear, touches an archetypical myth of the lost goddess, Sofia, whom was ousted from Christianity; for in the early Gnostic teachings there was Sofia and Jesus in the more allegorical rather than literalist teachings. In this story a young woman gets thrown into this goddess-like existence after a car accident. She wanders around spreading the word of peace and salvation to anyone who is receptive enough. The world reaches a boiling point and an earth-destroying comet hits annihilating everything but the souls of the pure.

What if you could travel back in time? What would you tell your younger self, if you had the opportunity? These are questions I've asked myself a thousand times, and Screw the Zoo is my answer. If you feel trapped, stuck in a rut, or in any way disheartened by the path your life has taken, then this book is for you. It contains every lesson, shortcut, and mind-hack I've found on my quest for freedom, broken down into practical lessons and simple steps that literally anyone can follow. This step-by-step guide to freedom will teach you: How to walk into a room, any room, and command attention and respect How to negotiate reality, redefine your worth, and achieve your dreams How to develop a Sherlockian-mind through the use of observational tricks and mnemonics How to control your body language and facial expressions to conceal your true feelings How to identify and break free from personal habits and traditions that are holding you back If you're ready to be free, to escape from your cage and forge your own path through life, then look no further. This is the road map through life that I wish I'd had from the very beginning.

In this dark comic novel by the author of Home Land, a college development officer’s last chance to keep his job comes at a high cost. A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice Milo Burke—husband, father, development officer at a third-tier university—has just joined the burgeoning class of the newly unemployed. Grasping after off jobs to support his wife and child, Milo is relieved to get another chance from his former boss. All he has to do is reel in a potential donor who, mysteriously, has requested Milo’s involvement. But it turns out that the ask is Milo’s sinister college classmate Purdy Stuart. And the “give” won’t come cheap. Exploring such themes as work, war, sex, class, child rearing, romantic comedies, Benjamin Franklin, cooking shows on death row, and the eroticization of chicken wire, The Ask is a hilarious tour de force from a writer who has already shown that the deepest fictions are often the funniest.

The essays in Home Words explore the complexity of the idea of home through various theoretical lenses and groupings of texts. One focus of this collection is the relation between the discourses of nation, which often represent the nation as home, and the discourses of home in children’s literature, which variously picture home as a dwelling, family, town or region, psychological comfort, and a place to start from and return to. These essays consider the myriad ways in which discourses of home underwrite both children’s and national literatures. Home Words reconfigures the field of Canadian children’s literature as it is usually represented by setting the study of English- and French-language texts side by side, and by paying sustained attention to the diversity of work by Canadian writers for children, including both Aboriginal peoples and racialized Canadians. It builds on the literary histories, bibliographical essays, and biographical criticism that have dominated the scholarship to date and sets out to determine and establish new directions for the study of Canadian children’s literature.

After a freakish death, a young Argentinian woman is left to observe the world outside of the "cage" of her body; through jarring vignettes and ruminations, acclaimed author García Lao creates a complex, intelligent, and subversive theater of the absurd.

From New York Times bestselling author Andy Andrews comes the return of one of our favorite characters: Jones, the Noticer, whose wise stories have comforted and guided millions of readers. In this third volume of The Noticer series, navigate the hope that the impossible can come true. At 3:29 a.m. on May 22, a telephone rings in Orange Beach, Alabama. Breaking the sleepy silence, a hastily whispered message heralds the news that readers have been waiting on for seven years: Jones is back in town. Apparently, however, he is also in jail. The old man is tight-lipped about the circumstances surrounding his brief incarceration. After arriving to bail him out, Andy is shocked to discover that his trusted friend has already opened an unusual business in one of the resort town’s most high-profile shopping districts. As the town moves from spring to summer, a practical joker is becoming bolder and more inventive with every prank that is pulled. Could Jones be behind some of it? Why? What’s the truth about that four-hundred-pound table in his store? And why does it look as if every person Jones meets has a secret they will reveal only to him? Based on a remarkable true story, Just Jones beautifully blends fiction, allegory, and inspiration. With rare insight, Andy and Jones take us on a journey that proves the importance of perspective, the power of connection, and the ability we all have to make the impossible come true. Standalone fictional novel based on true events Follows the character of Jones, a mysterious elderly man with endless wisdom who appears precisely when needed most Part of the bestselling Noticer series Book 1: The Noticer Book 2: The Noticer Returns Book 3: Just Jones

From the author of Runner, Sam Dryden comes under attack from unknown forces as an unremembered episode from his past threatens more than just his life. On an otherwise normal morning, former Special Forces operative Sam Dryden is the target of an unsuccessful attempted abduction. Using his attacker's cellphone, he learns that another person, a woman named Danica Ellis, is also being targeted. Dryden arrives just in time to save Danica from the assault team sent after her. But neither of them recognize the other, or have any idea why they are being targeted. The only clue is a heavily redacted, official-looking document given to Danica by her stepfather before he was killed. Dryden immediately recognizes it as a "scrub file." A scrub file is a record of what a subject knew before their memories were chemically destroyed. The redacted document refers to witnesses to a secret military site in Ashland, Iowa in 1989. Both Dryden and Danica Ellis lived in Ashland in 1989, when they were both twelve years old, though neither of them has any memory of the other. Switching back and forth between the present day, when Dryden and Danica try to elude the forces that are after them, and the past in Ashland, Iowa, when both were twelve, making a discovery that forever changed their lives, this latest Sam Dryden novel proves yet again that Patrick Lee is one of the most original, compelling thriller writers today.

“Reluctant readers and fans of the Wimpy Kid series and its ilk will appreciate the book’s dynamic type, graphics galore, cartoonish illustrations, and ironic footnotes.”—Kirkus Don’t call him scaredy-cat Sam, because Sam Wu IS NOT AFRAID of ghosts! Except . . . he totally is. Can he conquer his fear by facing the ghost that lives in the walls of his house? After an unfortunate (and very embarrassing) incident in the Space Museum, Sam goes on a mission to prove to the school bully, and all his friends, that he’s not afraid of anything—just like the heroes on his favorite show, Space Blasters. And when it looks like his house is haunted, Sam gets the chance to prove how brave he can be. A funny, touching, and charming story of ghost hunting, escaped pet snakes, and cats with attitude!