It is May 2026 when a strange anomaly transforms thousands of women around the world into mermaids. As Homeland Security agents begin investigating, they record their observations in a classified United States government report. There is no question that Operation Mermaid, originally founded in 1949, is back in full swing. Days later as several mermaids practice swimming in the open water, one finds a relic inside a shipwreck. Inside are plans for an abandoned Cold War era weapon known as Project Kraken. As a scientist's true identity is revealed, a Second Transformation rocks the world, increasing the size and scope of the mermaid population once again. As relationships change between mermaids, sirens, and the government, only time will tell if a worldwide disaster has been averted. In this intriguing science fiction tale, the lives of newly-initiated mermaids are intertwined with a failed Cold War project, leaving government agents to solve a complex puzzle.

A POPSUGAR Best Book of December 2020 An AMAZON Editors Pick December 2020 A SHE READS Best Historical Fiction Novel Winter 2021 A BUSTLE Most Anticipated Winter 2021 Read A LIBRO.FM Influencer Pick, December 2020 Inspired by true events on Korea's Jeju Island, Sumi Hahn's "entrancing [debut] novel, brimming with lyricism and magic" (Jennifer Rosner, The Yellow Bird Sings) explores what it means to truly love in the wake of devastation. In the aftermath of World War II, Goh Junja is a girl just coming into her own. She is the latest successful deep sea diver in a family of strong haenyeo. Confident she is a woman now, Junja urges her mother to allow her to make the Goh family's annual trip to Mt. Halla, where they trade abalone and other sea delicacies for pork. Junja, a sea village girl, has never been to the mountains, where it smells like mushrooms and earth. While there, she falls in love with a mountain boy Yang Suwol, who rescues her after a particularly harrowing journey. But when Junja returns one day later, it is just in time to see her mother take her last breath, beaten by the waves during a dive she was taking in Junja's place. Spiraling in grief, Junja sees her younger siblings sent to live with their estranged father. Everywhere she turns, Junja is haunted by the loss of her mother, from the meticulously tended herb garden that has now begun to sprout weeds, to the field where their bed sheets are beaten. She has only her grandmother and herself. But the world moves on without Junja. The political climate is perilous. Still reeling from Japan's forced withdrawal from the peninsula, Korea is forced to accommodate the rapid establishment of US troops. Junja's canny grandmother, who lived through the Japanese invasion that led to Korea's occupation understands the signs of danger all too well. When Suwol is arrested for working with and harboring communists, and the perils of post-WWII overtake her homelands, Junja must learn to navigate a tumultuous world unlike anything she's ever known.

"After finding my soon-to-be ex-husband with my soon-to-be ex-assistant, I realize his "for better or worse" didn't include my forties. A vacation on a remote Italian island sounds like the perfect antidote to a midlife crisis--until I arrive. I'm expecting Chianti and pasta, not a run-down bed and breakfast with the oldest Nonna in existence. There's something odd about this island, like how everyone calls me Mamma, or how I'm the first tourist in decades. And that's before I wake up to a talking chipmunk holding a glass of wine. He says I have something ancient in me, and for once, it's not my creaking joints. When I finally discover the island's deepest secrets, I know my forties are about to be fabulous, if only I can survive long enought to enjoy them." --

As we all know, there is a kind of lazy pleasure in useless and out-of-the-way erudition-The compilation and translation of this volume have given us a great deal of such pleasure; we hope the reader will share some of the fun we felt when ransacking the

As a game designer or new media storyteller, you know that the story is everything. However, figuring out how to tell it interactively-and in a way that keeps your audience coming back for more-can be challenging. Here to help you out (and to open your mind to ever more creative ways of producing those stories) is the man who created the cult publication The Art of Computer Game Design and who has devoted much of his career to that very topic: Chris Crawford. To highlight the path for future gains in the quest for a truly interactive story, Chris provides a solid sampling of what doesn't work, contrasting unsuccessful methodologies with those that hold promise for the future. Throughout you'll find examples of contemporary games that rely on different technologies-and learn the storytelling lessons to be garnered from each of the past methodologies. Within the context of interactive storytelling, Chris explores ways of providing conflict and challenge, the difference between low- and high-interactivity designs, the necessity to move beyond purely visual thinking (so that the player is engaged on multiple levels), and more.

Chosen RPG