Falling in love wasn't part of the plan.Eliza Quan fully expects to be voted the next editor-in-chief of her school paper. She works hard, she respects the facts, and she has the most experience. Len DiMartile is an injured star baseball player who seems to have joined the paper just to have something to do. Naturally, the staff picks Len to be their next leader. Because while they may respect Eliza, they don't particularly like her - but right now, Eliza is not here to be liked. She's here to win.But someone does like Eliza. A lot.Shame it's the boy standing in the way of her becoming editor-in-chief....

For many girls growing up in a generation saturated with social media, seeking "likes", comments, and friends online can become an obsession. Liked, written by author and mom of four daughters Kari Kampakis, offers positive, powerful insights to help girls build lasting relationships and navigate the digital age to break unhealthy obsessions with social media. Kari Kampakis has shared her tips and insight on the TODAY Show, HuffPost, and Yahoo! News. The topics covered in Liked are: Living for God's approval, not human approval Cultivating a true identity Using social media wisely Building a positive reputation online Spreading kindness, love, and compassion Distinguishing online friends from real friends Building deep connections that last Handling rejection, criticism, and volatile emotions Activating your Christian faith Making an eternal difference, not a temporary splash. With relatable age appropriate text, Liked will help: Girls, ages 11-18, to understand how to channel their talents and energies into things with eternal value and, in the process, find the love, friendships, confidence, and strength of character they desire Start great conversations that can quickly unite mothers, daughters, sisters, and friends Small group and youth group discussions for tweens and teens Kari Kampakis' Liked speaks to the female heart to address the need for approval with wisdom, hope, and grace.

Almost everyone has a fundamental need to be liked by other people. It is a healthy and normal part of life. However, the need to be liked can also be associated with emotional, behavioural and even personality problems. The Need to be Liked is a book that explores the dark side of this human need. The author (Dr. Roger Covin) is a clinical psychologist who weaves together psychological research with his own clinical experiences in order to present a unique and original way of thinking about the need to be liked. Drawing on research and theory from various fields of psychology, Dr. Covin explains how people's experience with painful rejection shapes their way of thinking about themselves and others. Readers will learn how problems with the need to be liked can lead to depression, anxiety and other mental health concerns. Dr. Covin describes how the need to be liked expresses itself in numerous ways, ranging from subtle behaviours to aspects of one's overall personality. For example, the need to be liked can affect... ...being overly career-driven ...alcohol and drug use ...promiscuity ...one's excessive focus on appearance ...the decision to remain in an abusive relationship ...rumination about past relationships ...being overly self-critical or perfectionistic ...continually entering into relationships where you find the wrong partner ...sabotaging relationships Finally, Dr. Covin provides useful strategies and suggestions for how to manage problems with needing to be liked and dealing with rejection. The Need to be Liked is a fascinating and timely examination of a topic that affects the vast majority of people. Grounded in current research and theory, and articulated through Dr. Covin's experiences as a therapist, this book is a must read for those who have ever wondered - why do I need to be liked?

A husband and teen daughter are challenged to redefine their understandings of family when a devoted wife and mother commits suicide and begins meddling from beyond the grave.

Literary Nonfiction. LGBTQIA Studies. Winner of the 2016 Essay Collection Competition. "Growing up queer in Florida in the 1980s, James Allen Hall's life has taken him to places that high culture rarely treads. Losing their once-thriving family business in the pre-crash 2000s, his broke and unstable parents move into a two-bedroom student apartment shared previously with just his brother. His mother routinely attempts or threatens suicide, his father is depressed. In these essays, Hall lives alongside, and empathically lives through, his family's meth addiction, mental illnesses, and incarcerations, and considers his own penchants for less than happy, equal sex with an agility, depth, and lightness that is blissfully inconclusive. I LIKED YOU BETTER BEFORE I KNEW YOU SO WELL is a tragic, funny, graceful book." --Chris Kraus "The essays collected in I LIKED YOU BETTER BEFORE I KNEW YOU SO WELL are indeed harrowing--but more powerfully, they reveal a sensibility driven to make something beautiful and worthy of the raw and the rough. Hall's work lays bare all manner of vulnerability, not to confess or shock, but to reckon into language the nearly unsayable. And who exactly is at the center of this drive toward the light? A witness, an unrelenting seeker, a survivor, someone who's earned the right to judge but who withholds that too-easy gesture in favor of a clearer sight and the hard won belief that while we are bound together by so many complex tethers, including cruelty, we are especially linked by compassion, a force abundantly evident in this moving collection." --Lia Purpura "'What I am should be extinguished, ' writes James Allen Hall about his queerness, which despite a journey through youth troubled with violence and homophobia, manages to exist and persist. Yet the personal essays in I LIKED YOU BETTER BEFORE I KNEW YOU SO WELL are more than expressions of pain, they are testaments to perseverance shaped by the acceptance of a flawed self, love for a complicated family and an unflappable wit. Thank you, James, for this extraordinary book so full of honest and compelling moments that will resonate with the aching heart inside each of us."--Rigoberto Gonzalez

Algonquin “Ali” Rhodes, the high school newspaper’s music critic, meets an intriguing singer, Doug, while reviewing a gig. He’s a weird-looking guy—goth, but he seems sincere about it, like maybe he was into it back before it was cool. She introduces herself after the set, asking if he lives in Cornersville, and he replies, in his slow, quiet murmur, “Well, I don’t really live there, exactly. . . .” When Ali and Doug start dating, Ali is falling so hard she doesn’t notice a few odd signs: he never changes clothes, his head is a funny shape, and he says practically nothing out loud. Finally Marie, the school paper’s fashion editor, points out the obvious: Doug isn’t just a really sincere goth. He’s a zombie. Horrified that her feelings could have allowed her to overlook such a flaw, Ali breaks up with Doug, but learns that zombies are awfully hard to get rid of—at the same time she learns that vampires, a group as tightly-knit as the mafia, don’t think much of music critics who make fun of vampires in reviews. . . .

“The exciting beginning of a promising new epic fantasy series. Prepare for ancient mysteries, innovative magic, and heart-pounding heists.”—Brandon Sanderson “Complex characters, magic that is tech and vice versa, a world bound by warring trade dynasties: Bennett will leave you in awe once you remember to breathe!”—Tamora Pierce In a city that runs on industrialized magic, a secret war will be fought to overwrite reality itself—the first in a dazzling new series from City of Stairs author Robert Jackson Bennett. Sancia Grado is a thief, and a damn good one. And her latest target, a heavily guarded warehouse on Tevanne’s docks, is nothing her unique abilities can’t handle. But unbeknownst to her, Sancia’s been sent to steal an artifact of unimaginable power, an object that could revolutionize the magical technology known as scriving. The Merchant Houses who control this magic—the art of using coded commands to imbue everyday objects with sentience—have already used it to transform Tevanne into a vast, remorseless capitalist machine. But if they can unlock the artifact’s secrets, they will rewrite the world itself to suit their aims. Now someone in those Houses wants Sancia dead, and the artifact for themselves. And in the city of Tevanne, there’s nobody with the power to stop them. To have a chance at surviving—and at stopping the deadly transformation that’s under way—Sancia will have to marshal unlikely allies, learn to harness the artifact’s power for herself, and undergo her own transformation, one that will turn her into something she could never have imagined.

These ten simple truths can build one big change in your daughter’s life. When Kari Kampakis wrote a blog post in July 2013 titled “10 Truths Young Girls Should Know,” the post went viral and was shared more than 65,000 times on Facebook. Obviously her message strikes a chord with moms and dads across the country. This nonfiction book for teen girls expands on these ten truths and brings a Christian message to the hearts of both moms and daughters. Teen girls deal daily with cliques, bullying, rejection, and social media nightmares. Kari Kampakis wants girls to know that they don’t have to compromise their integrity and future to find love, acceptance, and security. Her ten truths include: Kindness is more important than popularity. People peak at different times of life. Trust God’s plan for you. Get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Otherwise, you’ll never stick to your guns. Today’s choices set the stage for your reputation. You were born to fly. Fans of Kari's blog and newspaper column will not want to miss her first book. Filled with practical advice, loving support, and insightful discussion questions, 10 Ultimate Truths Girls Should Know is a timely and approachable list of guidelines that will help young girls navigate a broken world and become the young women God made them to be.

There is a popular saying: "You need to kiss a lot of toads before you meet your prince." Most movies and books tell the story of the prince. Not mine. This is a story about the toads. This book is about my failed relationships and dating stories so awful, you have to laugh. This book is for women, as we go through the same breakups, makeups, heartaches, and overall relationship roller-coaster rides. And this book is for men, to educate the male population on what not to do when you actually like a girl. Now, able to smile at my single status approaching thirty, I share the stories and toast the men who have impacted my life for better . . . and worse.

This book explores the usage and significance of the word "like" across a wide range of disciplines, focusing in particular on its influence in education and pedagogy. From the advent of the "like button" on Facebook to the common verbal tic, liking has become an integral part of our everyday lives. By drawing on feminist, queer, and other critical traditions, the authors evaluate this phenomenon in order to interrogate its history, its linguistic function, its role in labor and economics, and its ties to, and separation from, religion. As the notion of "like" becomes more and more ubiquitous, this critical volume demonstrates the need to consider like, liking, and likeability when thinking about the institutions that impact us daily.