Books with author Almondie Shampine

The first action-packed thriller in the MODULES series featuring Catina Salsbury.I always knew I was different from others. School came way easily, but friends did not. My sister Kadrin and I were the worst twins ever. The identical stopped at our physical characteristics. But that aside, I had my best friend, Charlie, and I was my conspiracy theorist Dad’s favorite. My life wasn’t bad and my future seemed promising . . . until the Reform. Following 6th grade graduation, the State took over our guardianship and our education, taking us from the only homes we’d ever known, in order to provide us with a distraction-free environment . . . and control every inch of our lives. We were poked, prodded, experimented on, and had to endure test after test after test. Our future depended on those tests, or rather the tests determined every aspect of our lives, present and future, for the rest of our lives. I had the 2nd highest IQ in the global nation for ages 12 to 18. I was the prodigy they were looking for to be the very image of promoting The Modules. That made me special. My personality, on the other hand, was a problem, a big one. I’d tested Purple. A Purple didn't fit into any category and couldn't be controlled in the same manner as everyone else. That made me a threat to the very system they were trying to create. My sister tested Pink. The only thing I cared about was not being separated from her. She was the only family I had left.The only thing they cared about was trying to control me and change my color, by segregating me from everyone else, including my sister, and experimenting on me to find the weapon that would be able to control people like me. They underestimated me though. I would stop at nothing to have my sister, and protect her, even when they turned her against me, even when I was the only Purple remaining. I went where she went, regardless of the tests. I wouldn’t stop fighting the tests’ makers or manipulating the tests, and I would not be controlled, until they gave me what I wanted. I underestimated them, though, because apparently they would stop at nothing either, and I was in for a very big surprise.

Book 2 in the Modules series, featuring the thrilling Catina SalsburyCat, here, but you can call me Catina. Boy, do I have a story to tell you. I’m 16 now. I don’t know if I’ll make it to 17, now that I went from being the very model of a new man-made era of Intelligent Design with the highest global IQ for ages 12-18, to top priority on the Modules’ to-kill list. The tests keep saying I have a personality glitch, regardless of my intelligence, and none of their techniques work on me. I’m unpredictable and I can’t be controlled.It all began with 'The Reform'. State recruiters came when we were 12 to take my twin sister and me from our homes and take over our guardianship. Following Junior School graduation, Kadrin and I wound up on two different buses. I’m one of the only Purple’s remaining. It doesn’t matter that I excelled, or quadrupled my learning, or can do things that other people can’t. I found the formula, the one they desperately need. They’ve taken everything from me, but I can’t die. I can’t. I need to save my twin sister, Kadrin, who was programmed against me. I need to save my only boyfriend, Charlie, who doesn’t even know who I am anymore. I need to save the world, because the only way they can have their Intelligent Design is if they do something foolish, like try to wipe out all the people they think are ignorant.

“How many years had I hated my father because I thought he had betrayed us, betrayed me? His paranoia, words, and teachings all a symptom of his mental illness; a mental illness he never had. They had controlled my suspicions the same way, by using the fear that I would wind up like my father if I didn’t keep it contained, hidden, buried deep inside me - the truth. The truth I had always known. My Dad may not have been able to save himself. He may not have been able to save Marathon, NY, or all the areas the parents that attended Kadrin’s ceremony had come from, but he was going to save all the rest of the lives, and he saved mine. My heart had been dead for so long. Now it was alive and beating strong. Cat! His legacy, to finish what he’d begun!Published successfully, it read.I turned the computer off, then backtracked through the woods. I tossed the computer into the Fountain. Sighing, I threw my phone in after the computer and returned to the Hole to come up with a name for my new baby brother. A child without a birth certificate or a social security number. A child that, to the government, didn’t exist. What they didn’t know could hurt them. I’d make sure of it.”

The eyes of the cat will tell you what you need to know ...‘I’d spent my life fighting for those I was loyal to. Now, I just wanted to run so that my losses would never catch up to me. I never wanted to feel again. Everyone else had wound up together. I’d wound up alone. Finally, I felt the anger, right down to the core of me, shaking me, escaping in a scream so loud and so fierce it sounded nothing like me. I wanted to avenge my losses so that I could know it was all worthwhile, and everything I’d done and sacrificed would be worth it. This was far from over. I wanted revenge!’Catina Salsbury returns in this action-packed dystopian thriller series (The Modules). Five years since The Reform, she’s intent on freeing everyone she can from The Modules, and figuring out those responsible for Intelligent Design, so that she can take them down for once and for all, while also wanting to fulfill her dream of being united with her twin sister, Kadrin, again, and finally being able to be with her childhood love, Charlie. Unfortunately, her loyalties to the cause and those she loves collide. Not just for her, but them as well. Catina’s determined to have both, regardless of the sacrifices she has to make, but so are they.Cat's Out of The Bag

As I floated, chattering in cold, the freezing waters spraying my face and mouth, the salt burning my throat; as the night tide whipped me back and forth, and I could see nothing but inky blackness for miles and miles all around me, and no sense of direction as to where the closest shore was, I wondered.To fight the bad guys, I’d had to become like them, with that precarious line so blurred that I could no longer tell the difference between the good and the bad guys, anymore, or even which one I now was. I’d caused a revolution. The perfect justice to fit their crimes.But what would my justice be? At the mercy and mercy alone of high-tide to do with me as it pleased, I tiredly closed my eyes. “I’m coming, Nana. I’m coming,” I said weakly.Catina Salsbury returns for the fifth book in the action-packed dystopian series, The Modules.

“So, I’ve been here over a month and a half now, but when I ask about my purpose, I’m not given an answer. I still want to kill these people.” – Catina SalsburyI needed to save the world. It wasn’t a want or a desire; it was a necessity. It was something I absolutely needed to do. Searching for the meaning behind it, I came up empty. Previously, I’d always had meaning attached to it. Fighting for my parents, my sister, Charlie, then fighting for my life. From there, my fight became taking the Modules down, fighting its Makers, which then led me to fighting the President, which turned into the entire government. For a time, I even thought the meaning behind it was pure vengeance, and wanting to avenge all my losses. In the end, all it came down to was it just being something I needed to do.Like destiny. Like it’s what I was meant for. Period.And then it hit like an epiphany, even though it’d been right there in front of my face the entire time.Meaning.I was meant to do this. So therefore, nothing was going to stop me from what I was meant to do. I’d never been clearer about anything else in my life. I had to do this!I was finally ready.

Four different kids, four different ages, four different lifestyles, but there is one thing they all have in common: A situation they want to escape from. Max Connor is 14 years old. At school, he’s a bully. At his trailer park, poverty-stricken home, he’s a victim of an alcoholic mother and an ever-worsening abusive father. Diane Rockway is the 15 year old daughter of her upper class political conservative father and lawyer mother. She is voted most popular at school until she winds up accidently pregnant. Her parents don’t want the scandal and will stop at nothing to make the ‘problem’ go away. James Doe is a 10 year old orphan who has spent his life bouncing from one foster care to the next, until his rebellious personality gets him transferred to a group home for boys. He’s tired of being unwanted and unloved, so he takes off on his own. Zoe Summers, 12 years old, lives with her father and two siblings, after her mother left when she was young. At school, though smart, she is deemed the weird girl. At home, she is responsible for all the things her mother once was, but she can’t meet all the father’s expectations, just like her mother couldn’t, nor does she want to any longer. Alone, they are stuck and helpless in being minors without rights, but when all their paths cross one day, their desperate needs outweigh their extraordinary differences, and they become the most unexpected of friends when they come across an abandoned 1800’s schoolhouse. No matter what happens or how difficult things get, they are bound by the pact they made. “We’re either all in this together, or we’re not in it at all.”

I always knew I was different from others. School came way easily, but friends did not. My sister Kadrin and I were the worst twins ever. The identical stopped at our physical characteristics. But that aside, I had my best friend, Charlie, and I was my conspiracy theorist Dad’s favorite. My life wasn’t bad and my future seemed promising . . . until the Reform. Following 6th grade graduation, the State took over our guardianship and our education, taking us from the only homes we’d ever known, in order to provide us with a distraction-free environment . . . and control every inch of our lives. We were poked, prodded, experimented on, and had to endure test after test after test. Our future depended on those tests, or rather the tests determined every aspect of our lives, present and future, for the rest of our lives. I had the 2nd highest IQ in the global nation for ages 12 to 18. I was the prodigy they were looking for to be the very image of promoting The Modules. That made me special. My personality, on the other hand, was a problem, a big one. I’d tested Purple. A Purple didn't fit into any category and couldn't be controlled in the same manner as everyone else. That made me a threat to the very system they were trying to create. My sister tested Pink. The only thing I cared about was not being separated from her. She was the only family I had left. The only thing they cared about was trying to control me and change my color, by segregating me from everyone else, including my sister, and experimenting on me to find the weapon that would be able to control people like me. They underestimated me though. I would stop at nothing to have my sister, and protect her, even when they turned her against me, even when I was the only Purple remaining. I went where she went, regardless of the tests. I wouldn’t stop fighting the tests’ makers or manipulating the tests, and I would not be controlled, until they gave me what I wanted. I underestimated them, though, because apparently they would stop at nothing either, and I was in for a very big surprise. The Reform is the first book in The Modules series featuring the brilliant, yet unruly Catina Salsbury.

Cat, here, but you can call me Catina. Boy, do I have a story to tell you. I’m 16 now. I don’t know if I’ll make it to 17, now that I went from being the very model of a new man-made era of Intelligent Design with the highest global IQ for ages 12-18, to top priority on the Modules’ to-kill list. The tests keep saying I have a personality glitch, regardless of my intelligence, and none of their techniques work on me. I’m unpredictable and I can’t be controlled. State recruiters came when we were 12 to take my twin sister and me from our homes and take over our guardianship. Following Junior School graduation, Kadrin and I wound up on two different buses. I’m one of the only Purple’s remaining. It doesn’t matter that I excelled, or quadrupled my learning, or can do things that other people can’t. I found the formula, the one they desperately need. They’ve taken everything from me, but I can’t die. I can’t. I need to save my twin sister, Kadrin, who was programmed against me. I need to save my only boyfriend, Charlie, who doesn’t even know who I am anymore. I need to save the world, because the only way they can have their Intelligent Design is if they do something foolish, like try to wipe out all the people they think are ignorant. The Modules is the 2nd book in 'The Modules' series, followed by The Reform, featuring the brilliant, humorous, yet highly unruly Catina Salsbury as she embarks on her journey through the Modules.

4 different kids, 4 different ages, 4 different lifestyles, but there is one thing they all have in common: A situation they want to escape from. Max Connor is 14 years old. At school, he’s a bully. At his trailer park, poverty-stricken home, he’s a victim of an alcoholic mother and an ever-worsening abusive father. Diane Rockway is the 15 year old daughter of her upper class political conservative father and lawyer mother. She is voted most popular at school until she winds up accidently pregnant. James Doe is a 10 year old orphan who has spent his life bouncing from one foster care to the next, until his rebellious personality gets him transferred to a group home for boys. Zoe Summers, 12 years old, lives with her father and two siblings. At school, though smart, she is deemed the weird girl. At home, she is responsible for all the things her mother once was, but she can’t meet all the father’s expectations, just like her mother couldn’t, nor does she want to any longer. Alone, they are stuck and helpless in being minors without rights, but when all their paths cross one day, their desperate needs outweigh their differences, and they become the most unexpected of friends when they come across an abandoned 1800’s schoolhouse.

As I floated, chattering in cold, the freezing waters spraying my face and mouth, the salt burning my throat; as the night tide whipped me back and forth, and I could see nothing but inky blackness for miles and miles all around me, and no sense of direction as to where the closest shore was, I wondered. To fight the bad guys, I’d had to become like them, with that precarious line so blurred that I could no longer tell the difference between the good and the bad guys, anymore, or even which one I now was. I’d caused a revolution. The perfect justice to fit their crimes. But what would my justice be? At the mercy and mercy alone of high-tide to do with me as it pleased, I tiredly closed my eyes. “I’m coming, Nana. I’m coming,” I said weakly. Catina Salsbury returns for the fifth book in the action-packed dystopian series, The Modules.

The eyes of the cat will tell you what you need to know... ‘I’d spent my life fighting for those I was loyal to. Now, I just wanted to run so that my losses would never catch up to me. I never wanted to feel again. Everyone else had wound up together. I’d wound up alone. Finally, I felt the anger, right down to the core of me, shaking me, escaping in a scream so loud and so fierce it sounded nothing like me. I wanted to avenge my losses so that I could know it was all worthwhile, and everything I’d done and sacrificed would be worth it. This was far from over. I wanted revenge!’ Catina Salsbury returns in this action-packed dystopian thriller series (The Modules). Five years since The Reform, she’s intent on freeing everyone she can from The Modules, and figuring out those responsible for Intelligent Design, so that she can take them down for once and for all, while also wanting to fulfill her dream of being united with her twin sister, Kadrin, again, and finally being able to be with her childhood love, Charlie. Unfortunately, her loyalties to the cause and those she loves collide. Not just for her, but them as well. Catina’s determined to have both, regardless of the sacrifices she has to make, but so are they. CAT'S OUT OF THE BAG!