A moving account by Auma Obama about her life in Africa and Europe, and her relationship with her brother, Barack Obama. While her younger brother Barack grew up in the U.S. and Indonesia, Auma Obama's childhood played out at the other end of the world in a remote village in Kenya, the birthplace of the siblings' shared father. Barack and Auma met for the first time in the 1980s, and they built a lasting relationship which lead to travels together in Kenya, research into their family history and finally Auma's support for her brother's political career and eventual bid for the U.S. presidency. Auma spent sixteen years studying and living in Germany, moved to England for love, and gave birth to a daughter there. The tension between her original and chosen worlds and cultures was a constant challenge, and eventually Auma returned to Africa and worked to support young men and women in shaping their futures. In And Then Life Happens, her candid and emotional memoir, Auma shares her own story as well as recollections of and experiences with her famous brother, who says about their first encounter: "I hugged her, we looked at each other, and laughed. I knew right then that I loved her."

From the 2005 Pulitzer Prize—winning columnist Connie Schultz comes fresh, clever, insightful commentary on life today: love, politics, social issues, family, and much, much more. In the tradition of Anna Quindlen, Molly Ivins, and Erma Bombeck, but with a distinctive voice and sensibility all her own, Connie Schultz comes out of the heartland of America to get you seeing, feeling, and thinking more deeply about the lives we lead today. “You might spot someone you know in the stories here,” writes Connie. “Maybe you’ll even find a glimpse of yourself. Yes, each of us is unique, but life happens in ways that bind us like Gorilla Glue.” In Life Happens, Connie shares sharp, passionate observations, winning our hearts with personal thoughts on a wide range of topics, from finding love in middle age to the meaning behind her father’s lunch pail, from single motherhood, to who really gets the tips you leave and why as the war in Iraq, race relations, gay marriage, and wwhy women don’t vote. In a more humorous vein, Connie shares her mother’s advice on men (“Don’t marry him until you see how he treats the waitress”) and warns men everywhere against using the dreaded f-word (it’s not the one you think). Along the way, Connie introduces us to the heroic people who populate our world and shows us how just one person can make a difference. Charming, provocative, funny, and perceptive, Life Happens gives us, for the first time, Connie Schultz’s celebrated commentary in one irresistible volume. Life Happens challenges us to be more open and alive to others and to the world around us.

Life. We all want to know how to make the best of it. We all want to know how to get the most out of it. We all want to have the best possible outcome with the least amount of opposition. The tools within these pages will help real people with real issues matriculate through real life, successfully. The riveting and thought provoking, material will help anyone, no matter what stage of life they are in, become better at handling LIFE when it happens.

Stuck in Neutral, a Printz Honor Book, introduced the world to Shawn McDaniel, a fourteen-year-old kid with cerebral palsy. But what happens next? Shawn's got a new perspective on life. But no one has a clue. That's because they can see only his wheelchair, his limp body, his drool. What they don't see? His brain, with perfect auditory memory. And his heart, which is in love with a girl. And his fierce belief that someday someone will realize there's way more to him than his appearance. How do you connect with others when you can't talk, walk, or even wave hello? In the sequel to Stuck in Neutral, which ALA Booklist called "an intense reading experience," Shawn McDaniel discovers a new definition of "normal" and finds that life happens next for everyone.

They were like sisters, until everything changed one summer night. Fourteen years later, they find themselves living in different countries with no communication. Anna has landed her dream job and is living a fast-paced life in Dublin, Ireland. When she’s diagnosed with a serious disease, she is forced to take on the biggest challenge she has ever encountered. Mia has found the love of her life and is living a glamorous life in Vienna, Austria when she finds out what happened to her old friend. Circumstances bring the two women together again, but is it too late for them to rebuild what they had? What really happened all those years ago? Together they embark on a journey to confront their pasts, and on the way they acquire life-changing insight and new perspectives. Life Happens is a touching story about friendship, career, and the biggest question of them all—why do so many of us avoid change until faced with hardship?

Churches have tried all kinds of ways to attract new and younger members - revised vision statements, hipper worship, contemporary music, livelier sermons, bigger and better auditoriums. But there are still so many people who aren't being reached, who don't want to come to church. And the truth is that attendance at church on Sundays does not necessarily transform lives; God's presence in our hearts is what changes us. Leaders and laypeople everywhere are realizing that they need new and more powerful ways to help them spread God's Word. According to international church starter and pastor Neil Cole, if we want to connect with young people and those who are not coming to church, we must go where people congregate. Cole shows readers how to plant the seeds of the Kingdom of God in the places where life happens and where culture is formed - restaurants, bars, coffeehouses, parks, locker rooms,and neighborhoods. Organic Church offers a hands-on guide for demystifying this new model of church and shows the practical aspects of implementing it.

Parker Cruse despises cheaters. It might have something to do with her boyfriend sleeping with her twin sister. After a wedding day prank involving a strong laxative, that ends the already severed relationship between the twins, Parker decides to grow up and act twenty-six. Step One: Move out of her parents' house. Step Two: Find a job. Opportunity strikes when she meets her new neighbor, Gus Westman. He's an electrician with Iowa farm-boy values and a gift for saying her name like it's a dirty word. He also has a wife. Sabrina Westman, head of a successful engineering firm, hires Parker as her personal assistant. Driven to be the best assistant ever, Parker vows to stay focused, walk the dog, go to the dry cleaners, and not kiss Gus-again. Step Three: Don't judge. Step Four: Remember- when life happens, it does it in a heartbeat.

She's Hiding Something… Well, everyone is hiding something—but Mya Donohue’s secret is knocking on the front door, in no uncertain terms. Mya is about to answer to the daughter she’d given birth to nineteen years ago, and Elle has news for her biological mother. Mya is not only a mom, but a grandmother, too. And Elle isn’t sticking around for long. She can’t. Offering Mya their assistance are her best friends—the only ones who will dare tell her the truth in unmitigated terms; her mother—a woman still sowing her own share of wild oats; and Elle’s father—a man of few words, but usually memorable ones, at that. (Note: Mya’s current fiancé has conveniently decided to take a long walk.)

Author Alivia Cahill learned that people are not merely reflections of their life experiences; they're reflections of their perceptions of, and reactions to, those life experiences. Henry David Thoreau said, "It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see." What's more, the response to what is seen can change life forever. This compilation of personal experiences illustrates how Alivia's unhealthy responses to a harsh environment shaped her life in many ways. Years of stewing quietly and bottling up negative emotions about life's adversities led to decades of self-abuse and devastating physical dis-ease. Fortunately, experiencing unconditional love and acquiring profound knowledge about the mind-body connection eventually led her on a path to wellness. Life Happens follows Alivia's agonizing journey of creating dis-ease and working towards healing, which sparks the motivation to make better choices in the face of hardship. The traumas described and lessons learned encourage a positive view of life's obstacles to be adopted to grow from them and allow them to positively shape the body, mind, and spirit so that wellness may be experienced, instead of simply dreamed about!