Books with author Brilliance Audio

Back in the 1860s, Ghost Horse, a handsome young sacred clown, loved and lost to death the beautiful warrior woman Red Dress. As their spirits seek desperately to be reunited, they influence the sometimes violent fate of those who have followed them. Now in the 1980s, Red Dress's teenage descendant Charlene Thunder has fallen hopelessly in love with Harley Wind Soldier, the dashing traditional dancer of Ghost Horse's lineage. When Harley's soul mate is killed in an accident, Charlene guiltily suspects her own grandmother, a notorious witch, of making it happen - just as she may well have caused the death of Harley's father and brother, which even today obsesses him. The Grass Dancer is a debut novel for Susan Power, an enrolled member of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe.

Maggie Silver has never minded her unusual life. Cracking safes for the world’s premier spy organization and traveling the world with her insanely cool parents definitely beat high school and the accompanying cliques, bad lunches, and frustratingly simple locker combinations. (If it’s three digits, why bother locking it at all?) But when Maggie and her parents are sent to New York City for her first solo assignment, her world is transformed. Suddenly, she’s attending a private school with hundreds of "mean girl" wannabes, trying to avoid the temptation to hack the school’s elementary security system, and working to befriend the aggravatingly cute son of a potential national security threat...all while trying not to blow her cover. From the hilarious and poignant author of Audrey, Wait! comes a fast-paced caper that proves that even the world’s greatest spies don’t have a mission plan for love.

Captain James Holland is the pilot on a routine flight from Frankfurt to New York, packed with people eager to be home for Christmas. When a passenger collapses from what appears to be a heart attack, Holland is forced to request an emergency landing at London's Heathrow Airport. But to his great surprise, the air traffic controllers will not let him land in England - they tell Holland that his sick passenger has contracted a dangerous new form of influenza and that the plane must return to Germany. But when German officials also refuse the landing, and other European countries follow suit, Holland begins to suspect that he's in much more trouble than anyone's letting on. In fact, his sick passenger is carrying a deadly virus accidentally released from a Bavarian laboratory, and it is feared that everyone on board is now infected. At the same time, someone with access to the CIA's computers wants to shoot the plane out of the sky, and there is a United States ambassador on board with powerful terrorist enemies who want to see him dead. While the panic on the ground spreads from the White House Situation Room to a small airport in the Ukrainian Republic, Captain Holland has only one concern: Where and when can he land?

The summer of 1976 should have been the best of times for nature-loving Eli Book, but instead it is filled with terrible changes. His sister begins to hate her country. His beautiful but distant mother is caught between his traumatized Vietnam War vet father and his former antiwar protester aunt, who has come to live with them. And the only person with whom he can be himself, his best friend, Edie, begins to turn inward when her parents split up. Watching from the sidelines while his world falls apart, Eli must take his first courageous steps toward truth-telling and adulthood.

Meet rufa red knot B95. Scientists call him the Moonbird because, in the course of his astoundingly long lifetime, this robin-sized shorebird has flown the distance to the moon - and halfway back! Each February he joins a flock that lifts off from Tierra del Fuego, headed for breeding grounds in the Canadian Arctic, 9,000 miles away. Late in the summer, he begins the return journey. B95 can fly for days, but eventually he must descend to refuel and rest. However, recent changes at stopover sites along his migratory circuit - changes caused mostly by human activity - have reduced the food available and made it harder for the birds to reach. During B95’s lifetime, the worldwide rufa population has collapsed by nearly 80 percent. Still, the Moonbird wings on; he is now nearly 20 years old. Shaking their heads, scientists ask themselves: How can this one bird make it year after year when so many others fall? National Book Award-winning author Phillip Hoose shows the obstacles rufa red knots face, introduces a worldwide team of scientists and conservationists trying to save them, and offers insights about what we can do to help shorebirds before it’s too late. With inspiring prose, thorough research, and stirring images, Hoose explores the tragedy of extinction through the triumph of a single bird.

After being teased one too many times, Ignatius MacFarland decides to build a rocket. Maybe extraterrestrials are nicer than his classmates! But when his rocket takes an explosive wrong turn, Ignatius ends up in another frequency run by former English-teacher-turned-dictator, Chester Arthur. Mr. Arthur has taken the art, culture, and advancements of our world, shared them with this new frequency, and convinced the creatures around him that he's a genius. It's up to Iggy and Karen, another trapped frequenaut, to expose Mr. Arthur for the fraud that he is - and to hopefully make it home alive. Part comedy, part science fiction, and part fantasy, this debut novel makes being a geek, well, kind of cool.

Amalee’s world is out of order. She’s used to things being all over the place, because of the frequent presence of her father’s bantering, bickering group of friends. But now everything is a big question mark. School isn’t what it used to be, and Amalee’s not really sure she likes her friends anymore. Life is a mystery that’s weighing her down.Then Amalee’s dad becomes seriously ill, and life becomes even more complicated. The world quiets to a whisper... until Amalee finds help from some very unexpected places.

"One day I’m going to play for the U.S. Women’s National Team." That’s what Flora Dupre promised her mom, before her mom died of cancer. Flora and her mom had created a place called Soccerland, an escape world where they went and just talked soccer. And now Flora’s dream of playing for the U.S.A. might be coming true. Flora’s received the invitation of a lifetime: the chance to try out for the Under-15 U.S. Girls’ Soccer Team, an opportunity that could put Flora on the road to making her dream a reality and reaching the real "Soccerland". But when Flora arrives at the International Sports Academy, the level of talent there is like nothing she’s ever seen before. Flora struggles to hold her own, grappling with new positions on the pitch, injuries, a frustrating coach, and contempt from other players. But Flora is a big, strong Dupre girl - and she’s not going to go down easy.

Abby Carnelia is an average sixth grader. She gets along okay with her parents, does pretty well in school, and has an annoying little brother. There's absolutely nothing remarkable about her at all - that is, until the day when she happens to tug on her earlobes while standing in front of a hard-boiled egg. That's the day Abby discovers there's something very, very special about her after all: she has a magical power, and there are some people who will do anything to find out where it came from.

When Amalee’s grandmother dies, she inherits a very strange object: a huge champagne bottle filled with over a thousand dollars’ worth of change. Amalee is told to spend the money on something important, so she decides to make a movie about endangered species. Soon there’s as much going on behind the scenes as there is in front of the camera, as Amalee deals with a new friend, a very cute older boy, her wacky family friends, and other challenges. She also discovers something she never expected to find: a link with her mother, who disappeared and died when Amalee was very little. Behind the camera, Amalee comes to understand that the past can never be changed. But the future? Well, that’s another story.