Fortune's Bones

Fortune's Bones
Author: Marilyn Nelson
Publisher: Boyds Mills Press
Total Pages: 38
Release: 2016-08-01
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 1629795887

Winner of the Coretta Scott King Book Award For young readers comes a poetic commemoration of the life of an 18th-century slave, from a past poet laureate and three-time National Book Award finalist For over 200 years, the Mattatuck Museum in Connecticut has housed a mysterious skeleton. In 1996, community members decided to find out what they could about it. Historians discovered that the bones were those of an enslaved man named Fortune, who was owned by a local doctor. After Fortune’s death, the doctor rendered the bones. Further research revealed that Fortune had married, had fathered four children, and had been baptized later in life. His bones suggest that after a life of arduous labor, he died in 1798 at about the age of 60. The Manumission Requiem is Marilyn Nelson’s poetic commemoration of Fortune’s life. Detailed notes and archival photographs enhance the reader’s appreciation of the poem.

The Hazards of Good Fortune

The Hazards of Good Fortune
Author: Seth Greenland
Publisher: Europa Editions
Total Pages: 503
Release: 2018-08-21
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1609454634

“An entertaining tale rich in schadenfreude as bad things happen to a hapless billionaire” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review). Jay Gladstone was born to privilege. He is a civic leader and a generous philanthropist, as well as the owner of an NBA team. But in today’s New York, even a wealthy man’s life can spin out of control, no matter the money or influence he possesses. Jay sees himself as a moral man, determined not to repeat his father’s mistakes. He would rather focus on his unstable second marriage and his daughter, Aviva, than worry about questions of race or privilege. However, he moves through a sensitive and aware world: that of Dag Maxwell, the black star forward, and white police officer Russell Plesko, who makes a decision that has resonating consequences—particularly for a DA whose hopes for a future in politics will rest on an explosive prosecution. Set during Barack Obama’s presidency, this artful novel illuminates contemporary America and does not shy away from questions about our scalding social divide—why is conversation about race so fraught, to what degree is the justice system impartial, and does great wealth inoculate those who have it?—and explores the aftermath of unforgivable errors and the unpredictability of the court of public opinion. “Greenland takes a Dickensian delight in letting the plot sprawl with parallels, digressions, false leads, and twists.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “A wild and funny page-turner of a novel that grabs you and doesn’t let go.” —Larry David

Fortune's Folly

Fortune's Folly
Author: Deva Fagan
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company (BYR)
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2009-04-14
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 1429992395

Ever since her mother died and her father lost his shoemaking skills, Fortunata has survived by telling fake fortunes. But when she's tricked into telling a grand fortune for a prince, she is faced with the impossible task of fulfilling her wild prophecy—or her father will be put to death. Now Fortunata has to help Prince Leonato secure a magic sword, vanquish a wicked witch, discover a long-lost golden shoe, and rescue the princess who fits it. If only she hadn't fallen in love with the prince herself !

The Fortunes

The Fortunes
Author: Peter Ho Davies
Publisher: HarperCollins
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2016-09-06
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0544263782

An NPR Best Book of the Year: “The most honest, unflinching, cathartically biting novel I’ve read about the Chinese American experience.” —Celeste Ng, #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Our Missing Hearts Winner, Anisfield-Wolf Book Award * Winner, Chautauqua Prize *Finalist, Dayton Literary Peace Prize * A New York Times Notable Book * A Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year Sly, funny, intelligent, and artfully structured, The Fortunes recasts American history through the lives of Chinese Americans and reimagines the multigenerational novel through the fractures of immigrant family experience. Inhabiting four lives—a railroad baron’s valet who unwittingly ignites an explosion in Chinese labor; Hollywood’s first Chinese movie star; a hate-crime victim whose death mobilizes the Asian American community; and a biracial writer visiting China for an adoption—this novel captures and capsizes over a century of our history, showing that even as family bonds are denied and broken, a community can survive—as much through love as blood. “Intense and dreamlike . . . filled with quiet resonances across time.” —The New Yorker “Riveting and luminous . . . Like the best books, this one haunts the reader well after the end.” —Jesmyn Ward, National Book Award-winning author of Sing, Unburied, Sing “A moving, often funny, and deeply provocative novel about the lives of four very different Chinese Americans as they encounter the myriad opportunities and clear limits of American life . . . gorgeously told.” —Chang-rae Lee, Buzzfeed “A poignant, cascading four-part novel . . . Outstanding.” —David Mitchell, The Guardian

Mr. Fortune's Trials

Mr. Fortune's Trials
Author: Henry Christopher Bailey
Publisher:
Total Pages: 264
Release: 1926
Genre: Detective and mystery stories, English
ISBN:

Booktalks and Beyond

Booktalks and Beyond
Author: Lucy Schall
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 297
Release: 2007-05-30
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0313094691

Promote today's best and most popular YA books with help from this practical guide. Focusing on titles published after 2000, Schall provides you with background information, ready-to-use (or adapt) booktalks, read-aloud selections, learning activities, and related reads for approximately 100 fiction and nonfiction books with broad teen appeal. Organized by genres and themes, it has something for every teen reader. Whether you are a public or school librarian, teacher, or teen group leader, you'll find this collection helpful in motivating teens to read, building their appreciation of books, and in extending learning opportunities beyond the reading experience. Grades 6-12.

Faster Than Light

Faster Than Light
Author: Marilyn Nelson
Publisher: LSU Press
Total Pages: 175
Release: 2012-11-12
Genre: Poetry
ISBN: 0807147354

Conjuring numerous voices and characters across oceans and centuries, Faster Than Light explores widely disparate experiences through the lens of traditional poetic forms. This volume contains a selection of Marilyn Nelson's new and uncollected poems as well as work from each of her lyric histories of eighteenth-, nineteenth-, and twentieth-century African American individuals and communities. Poems include the stories of historical figures like Emmett Till, the fourteen-year-old boy lynched in 1955, and the inhabitants of Seneca Village, an African American community razed in 1857 for the creation of Central Park. "Bivouac in a Storm" tells the story of a group of young soldiers, later known as the Tuskegee Airmen, as they trained near Biloxi, Mississippi, "marching in summer heat / thick as blackstrap molasses, under trees / haunted by whippings." Later pieces range from the poet's travels in Africa, Europe, and Polynesia, to poems written in collaboration with Father Jacques de Foiard Brown, a former Benedictine monk and the subject of Nelson's playful fictional fantasy sequence, "Adventure-Monk!" Both personal and historical, these poems remain grounded in everyday details but reach toward spiritual and moral truths.

Alice's Army

Alice's Army
Author: ALYCIA RIPLEY
Publisher: Trafford Publishing
Total Pages: 207
Release: 2014-02-27
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1490726209

Ten years have passed since the events of The Final Alice. While mourning the death of a team member, Alice Pleasance must come to terms with the sacrifices inherent in the job she accepted, one that does not allow vacations or weekends. A job which forces her to never age and never die, making friendships outside the team nearly impossible. Now a perfect hunter and tracker, Alice is emotionally isolated and haunted by a constant stream of nightmares involving twins, a screaming man, and a mysterious shack. When a serial killer embarks on a murder spree in Nigeria, Alice and her team prepare to eliminate the threat. They join forces with the heir of a petroleum dynasty gifted with a unique and powerful ability all his own. But before long, they realize the current murders involve an angry and vengeful old enemy. Gritty and atmospheric, Alices Army centers on the forces of good and evil in our modern world. It examines the powerful grip of emotional addictions as well as the psychology of fear. This middle chapter of the trilogy reflects on each team members beginnings and defines the concept of family as those who stand alongside us in the darkest of hours against the most terrible of threats. Ripley's undeniable, infectious love for these characters is superpowered. Alice is back with her motley crew of supernatural karma commandos in tow. Battle-tested, wiser, and more complex as a team, the new dynamic serves as rocket fuel for the author's unmistakable voice to shine. Filled with wild imagery, fierce action, genuine emotion and pure whimsy, few authors can so effortlessly glide between a high-velocity narrative and complete phantasmagoria. I loved it! -Michael Wandmacher, film composer: My Bloody Valentine, The Last Exorcism: Part II Alycia Ripley writeswith grace and delicacy about the sometimes very violent fantasies of young women in a threatening world. The books in her Alice series come to life with their haunting imagery and lyrical prose. These fantasy stories about the adventures of the granddaughter of Alice in Wonderland explore a darker side of one young woman's response to life's challenges. With Alice's Army she continues the saga of a badass Alice who refuses to be undone. Her strange journey will surprise and delight readers with its many twists and turns. -Nancy Jo Sales, author of The Bling Ring