The long-awaited novel from the best-selling, award-winning author of Evening is a literary tour de force set in war-torn Africa. Esther is a Ugandan teenager abducted by the Lord's Resistance Army and forced to witness and commit unspeakable atrocities, who is struggling to survive, to escape, and to find a way to live with what she has seen and done. Jane is an American journalist who has traveled to Africa, hoping to give a voice to children like Esther and to find her center after a series of failed relationships. In unflinching prose, Minot interweaves their stories, giving us razor-sharp portraits of two extraordinary young women confronting displacement, heartbreak, and the struggle to wrest meaning from events that test them both in unimaginable ways. With mesmerizing emotional intensity and stunning evocations of Africa's beauty and its horror, Minot gives us her most brilliant and ambitious novel yet.

A New York Times Notable Book An Economist Best Book of the Year Esther Akello is one of thirty Ugandan teenage girls abducted from a Catholic boarding school by rebel bandits. Held captive by the Lord’s Resistance Army, Esther is forced to witness and commit unspeakable atrocities. She struggles to survive, to escape, and to find a way to live with what she has seen and done. Jane Wood is a sensual, idealistic American writer who is traveling across Africa, hoping to give a voice to young people like Esther and to find her own center. In unflinching prose, Minot interweaves the stories of these two astonishing young women who, as they confront displacement and heartbreak, are hurtled inexorably closer to one another. With mesmerizing emotional intensity and stunning evocations of Africa’s struggles and beauty, Susan Minot gives us her most brilliant novel yet.

Part biography, part guidebook to the contemporary environmental movement, this book is the perfect gift for future and current activists and changemakers! Girls Who Green the World features the inspiring stories of 34 revolutionaries fighting for our future! An inspired collection of profiles, featuring environmental changemakers, social entrepreneurs, visionaries and activists. Journalist Diana Kapp has crisscrossed this country writing for and about empowered girls, girls who expect to be leaders, founders and inventors. This book takes it a step further. It says to girls: while you’re striving to be CEOs and world leaders, consider solving the biggest challenge of our lifetime, too—because you can do both at the same time, and here are 34 women doing just that.

A 13-year-old girl growing up in Mexico is visited by her 30-year-old future self in this powerful Young Adult novel in verse about accepting yourself. Out of nowhere, a lady comes up to Anamaría and says she's her, from the future. But Anamaría's thirteen, she knows better than to talk to some weirdo stranger. Girls need to be careful, especially in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico--it's the 90's and fear is overtaking her beloved city as cases of kidnapped girls and women become alarmingly common. This thirty-year-old "future" lady doesn't seem to be dangerous but she won't stop bothering her, switching between cheesy Hallmark advice about being kind to yourself, and some mysterious talk about saving a girl. Anamaría definitely doesn't need any saving, she's doing just fine. She works hard at her strict, grade-obsessed middle school--so hard that she hardly gets any sleep; so hard that the stress makes her snap not just at mean girls but even her own (few) friends; so hard that when she does sleep she dreams about dying--but she just wants to do the best she can so she can grow up to be successful. Maybe Thirty's right, maybe she's not supposed to be so exhausted with her life, but how can she ask for help when her city is mourning the much bigger tragedy of its stolen girls? This thought-provoking, moving verse novel will lead adult and young adult readers alike to vital discussions on important topics--like dealing with depression and how to recognize this in yourself and others--through the accessible voice of a thirteen-year-old girl. Alessandra Narváez Varela was born and raised in Ciudad Juárez, México. She earned a B.S. in Biology and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Texas at El Paso, where she now teaches. This is her debut novel.

In What My Mother Gave Me, women look at the relationships between mothers and daughters through a new lens: a daughter’s story of a gift from her mother that has touched her to the bone and served as a model, a metaphor, or a touchstone in her own life. The contributors of these thirty-one original pieces include Pulitzer Prize winners, perennial bestselling novelists, and celebrated broadcast journalists. Whether a gift was meant to keep a daughter warm, put a roof over her head, instruct her in the ways of womanhood, encourage her talents, or just remind her of a mother’s love, each story gets to the heart of a relationship. Rita Dove remembers the box of nail polish that inspired her to paint her nails in the wild stripes and polka dots she wears to this day. Lisa See writes about the gift of writing from her mother, Carolyn See. Cecilia Muñoz remembers both the wok her mother gave her and a lifetime of home-cooked family meals. Judith Hillman Paterson revisits the year of sobriety her mother bequeathed to her when Paterson was nine, the year before her mother died of alcoholism. Abigail Pogrebin writes about her middle-aged bat mitzvah, for which her mother provided flowers after a lifetime of guilt for skipping her daughter’s religious education. Margo Jefferson writes about her mother’s gold dress from the posh department store where they could finally shop as black women. Collectively, the pieces have a force that feels as elemental as the tides: outpourings of lightness and darkness; joy and grief; mother love and daughter love; mother love and daughter rage. In these stirring words we find that every gift, ?no matter how modest, tells the story of a powerful bond. As Elizabeth Benedict points out in her introduction, “whether we are mothers, daughters, aunts, sisters, or cherished friends, we may not know for quite some time which presents will matter the most."

Winner of the ALA Stonewall Book Award—Barbara Gittings Literature Award Named Best Book of the Year by Bustle Named Most Anticipated Book of the Year by The Millions, Electric Literature, and HuffPost ​The author of the “vivid and urgent…important and timely” (The New York Times Book Review) debut The Map of Salt and Stars returns with this remarkably moving and lyrical novel following three generations of Syrian Americans who are linked by a mysterious species of bird and the truths they carry close to their hearts. Five years after a suspicious fire killed his ornithologist mother, a closeted Syrian American trans boy sheds his birth name and searches for a new one. He has been unable to paint since his mother’s ghost has begun to visit him each evening. As his grandmother’s sole caretaker, he spends his days cooped up in their apartment, avoiding his neighborhood masjid, his estranged sister, and even his best friend (who also happens to be his longtime crush). The only time he feels truly free is when he slips out at night to paint murals on buildings in the once-thriving Manhattan neighborhood known as Little Syria. One night, he enters the abandoned community house and finds the tattered journal of a Syrian American artist named Laila Z, who dedicated her career to painting the birds of North America. She famously and mysteriously disappeared more than sixty years before, but her journal contains proof that both his mother and Laila Z encountered the same rare bird before their deaths. In fact, Laila Z’s past is intimately tied to his mother’s—and his grandmother’s—in ways he never could have expected. Even more surprising, Laila Z’s story reveals the histories of queer and transgender people within his own community that he never knew. Realizing that he isn’t and has never been alone, he has the courage to officially claim a new name: Nadir, an Arabic name meaning rare. As unprecedented numbers of birds are mysteriously drawn to the New York City skies, Nadir enlists the help of his family and friends to unravel what happened to Laila Z and the rare bird his mother died trying to save. Following his mother’s ghost, he uncovers the silences kept in the name of survival by his own community, his own family, and within himself, and discovers the family that was there all along. Featuring Zeyn Joukhadar’s signature “magical and heart-wrenching” (The Christian Science Monitor) storytelling, The Thirty Names of Night is a timely exploration of how we all search for and ultimately embrace who we are.

New York Times bestselling crime writer John Glatt tells the true story behind the kidnappings and long-overdue rescue of three women found in a Cleveland basement. The Lost Girls tells the truly amazing story of Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight, who were kidnapped, imprisoned, and repeatedly raped and beaten in a Cleveland house for over a decade by Ariel Castro, and their amazing escape in May 2013, which made headlines all over the world. The book has an exclusive interview and photographs of Ariel Castro's secret fiancé, who spent many romantic nights in his house of horror, without realizing he had bound and chained captives just a few feet away. There are also revealing interviews with several Castro family members, musician friends and several neighbors who witnessed the dramatic rescue.

True stories of young women who made a big difference! From authors to activists, painters to politicians, inventors to icons, these inspiring teenagers are proof that girls can change the world. Joan of Arc. Anne Frank. Cleopatra. Pocahontas. Mary Shelley. Many of these heroines are well-known. But have you heard of Sybil Ludington, a 16-year-old daughter of an American colonel who rode twice as far as the far better-remembered Paul Revere to warn the militia that the British army was invading? This fascinating book, Teen Trailblazers, features 30 young women who accomplished remarkable things before their twentieth birthdays. Visually compelling with original illustrations, this book will inspire the next generation of strong, fearless women.

Fleur Waters never takes anything seriously--until she shows up at her local boxing club one day to prove a point. She's the only girl there, and the warm-up alone is exhausting . . . but the workout gives her an escape from home and school, and when she lands her first uppercut on a punching bag she feels a rare glow of satisfaction. So she goes back the next week, determined to improve. Fleur's overprotective mom can't abide the idea of her entering a boxing ring (why won't she join her pilates class instead?). Her friends don't get it either and even her boyfriend, 'Prince' George, seems concerned by her growing muscles and appetite--but it's Fleur's body, Fleur's life. So she digs in her heels in hope that she can overcome the obstacles and strike a blow for equality.

Mama of ten Abbie Halberstadt helps women humbly and gracefully rise to the high calling of motherhood without settling for mediocrity or losing their minds in the process. Motherhood is a challenge. Unfortunately, our worldly culture offers moms little in the way of real help. Mamas only connect to celebrate surviving another day and to share in their misery rather than rejoice in what God has done and to build each other up in hard times. There has a be a better way, a biblical way, for mamas to grow and thrive. As a daughter of Christ, you have been called to be more than an average mama. Attaining excellence doesn’t have to be unsettling but it will take committed focus and a desire to parent well according to God’s grace and for His glory. M is for Mama offers advice, encouragement, and scripturally sound strategies seasoned with a little bit of humor to help you embrace the challenge of biblical motherhood and raise your children with love and wisdom. Mama, you are worthy of the awesome responsibility God has given you. Now it’s time to start believing you can live up to it.