Books with author Rob Thomas

From the creator of Veronica Mars comes a timely novel that looks at a high school fundraising tradition of auctioning off students as “slaves.”At Robert E. Lee High School, the traditional fundraising event is Slave Day, in which the student leaders and faculty are auctioned off as slaves for the winning bidders. Keene Davenport is outraged and plans to stay home to protest this racist practice. But his mom won’t let him skip school, and he finds that none of his classmates took his protest seriously. So instead he decides on an alternative path of civil disobedience—he will “buy” Shawn Greeley, the school’s first black student body president. Told in eight alternating perspectives, Slave Day is a powerful novel featuring beauty queens, geeks, class clowns, and football players—and none of them will come out of it the same.

A top-selling teacher resource line, The 100+ Series(TM) features over 100 reproducible activities in each book!Help your student form a solid understanding of the Spanish language. Building on the basics, this book covers common phrases, functional vocabulary, conjugation of verbs, basic grammar, and sentence structure. Over 100 pages of reproducible activities get your students started on the path to speaking and writing Spanish. The activities provided offer fun and varied exercises to practice concepts and vocabulary. Students learn to tell time, formulate sentences,conjugate verbs, pose and answer questions, and make comparisons; all while learning about Spanish-speaking culture.

Steve details his descent from bright star to burnout in this newly repackaged edition of the definitive, highly acclaimed novel from the creator of Veronica Mars and Party Down.Houston, sophomore year: Steve is on top of the world. He and his friends are the talk of the school. He’s in love with a terrific girl. He can even deal with “the astronaut”—a world-famous hero who happens to be his father. San Diego, senior year: Steve is bummed out, drugged out, flunking out. A no-nonsense counselor says he can graduate if he writes a 100-page paper. So Steve starts writing, and as the paper becomes more and more personal, he reveals how a National Merit Scholar has become an under-achieving stoner. And in telling how he got to where he is, Steve discovers how to get to where he wants to be.

Keene Davenport has called for a student walkout to protest his school’s annual “Slave Day” fundraiser, but it’s not exactly working. Shawn Greeley, the first African American student council president of Robert E. Lee High, continues to preside over the auctioning of student reps to serve as book-toters, chauffeurs, and lunch-fetchers for the day. So Keene chooses an alternative path of civil disobedience: Assuming that a day of degradation ought to open Shawn’s eyes, Keene decides to “buy” Shawn to be his slave, no matter what the cost—and launches a series of life-changing events in the process.

THE BURNING is the fourth in the western series, A Jess Williams Novel. In book three, Jess rescues a nice family of four and escorts them to where they plan on building a new homestead on land they own. In book four, Jess returns to help the family finish building their home and when he gets there, he finds out that all four of them have been murdered and their home burned down to the ground by the three Bolin brothers, Lance, Felix and Burt. Before killing the two children, Jessica and Harold, Burt Bolin does some unthinkable things to them. Jess sets off on their trail, hell-bent to make them pay for what they did.Along the way, Jess runs into United States Marshal Frank Reedy who asks Jess to detour from hunting the Bolin brothers and help the Marshal deal with a rich rancher, Evan Dwight, who is running out the other small ranchers in the area; and if they don't sell cheap, they end up dead.Jess again finds himself in a war with dozens of hired guns, but in the end, Jess and Marshal Reedy are still standing, and Evan Dwight ends up in the ground. When that is over, Jess continues on his hunt for the Bolins, and he never stops until he kills every last one of them. To make his job even more difficult, it seems a rich banker from New York City has placed a ten thousand blood bounty on his head because Jess killed his brother, and every hired gun in the west is looking to collect the blood bounty. An exciting, action-packed novel you won't be able to put down.

Jess was on the hunt for Chance Beauregard when he runs into a trapper, Chad Buntner, who is down on his luck. He agrees to let him ride with him just long enough to catch Beauregard, but Buntner turns out to be cursed with bad luck. Things keep happening to Buntner, and when Jess tries to leave him behind, Buntner takes a bullet meant for Jess. He feels guilty about Buntner taking the bullet, so he reluctantly agrees to let him accompany him.Along the way, they run into a cattle rancher, George Wesley, who is in a feud with an unscrupulous sheep rancher by the name of Barney Fiddler. Wesley has a couple of his men transport two hundred thousand dollars to his bank in San Antonio. When they end up dead and the money is missing, Wesley runs into Jess and convinces him to find the men responsible for the killings and get his money back.Jess takes the job, but he’s not sure he’ll survive this one with Buntner having one problem after another. He begins to wonder if he’ll ever finish the job or end up with a dirt blanket because of Buntner and his seemingly cursed luck that hangs over them like a dark cloud.

Walt Disney is an American hero. From Mickey Mouse to Disneyland, he changed the face of American culture. His is a success story like no other: a man who developed animated film into an art form and made a massive contribution to the folklore of the world.After years of research, respected Hollywood biographer Bob Thomas produced a definitive biography of the man behind the legend of Disney: the unschooled cartoonist from Kansas City who when bankrupt on his first movie venture and developed into the genius who produced unmatched works of animation, and ultimately was the creative spirit of an international entertainment empire that has enchanted generations. Complete with a collection of rare photographs, Walt Disney: An American Original is a fascinating and inspirational work that captures the spirit of Walt Disney.

Steve details his descent from bright star to burnout in this newly repackaged edition of the definitive, highly acclaimed novel from the creator of Veronica Mars and Party Down.Houston, sophomore year: Steve is on top of the world. He and his friends are the talk of the school. He’s in love with a terrific girl. He can even deal with “the astronaut”—a world-famous hero who happens to be his father. San Diego, senior year: Steve is bummed out, drugged out, flunking out. A no-nonsense counselor says he can graduate if he writes a 100-page paper. So Steve starts writing, and as the paper becomes more and more personal, he reveals how a National Merit Scholar has become an under-achieving stoner. And in telling how he got to where he is, Steve discovers how to get to where he wants to be.

A top-selling teacher resource line, The 100+ Series(TM) features over 100 reproducible activities in each book!Help your students get a jump start on learning Spanish! With more than 100 reproducible activity pages from which to choose, guide your class through the basics of the Spanish language. Begin with letters of the alphabet and numbers, then progress through functional vocabulary. Use the activities to teach your students about colors, weather, food, clothing, animals, the city, and other everyday topics. Activity pages present vocabulary in well-defined categories, and accompanying illustrations assure that your students will learn Spanish in meaningful context. This book is a practical resource filled with fun learning activities. It is an absolute must for the beginning Spanish classroom.

A lonely teenage boy whose father has moved them too often for him to make lasting friendships.A mysterious neighbor his own age who hums as he gardens... at night... surrounded by fireflies.Superstition is the town Thaddeus Cane and his father, Nathan, have settled in this time, and every evening Thaddeus becomes more intrigued with his new neighbor. When Thaddeus finally works up the nerve to visit his neighbor, the crush blooming underneath surfaces, and he realizes that Teofil, the midnight gardener, is lonely as well. When his father finds out where he's been spending his time, Thaddeus is forbidden from returning. But the attraction is too strong, and soon Thaddeus is back in Teofil's yard, leading to the revelation of long held secrets that upend Thaddeus' quiet life and sends him on the adventure of a lifetime.

Jess is doing what he does best. Hunting down the worst of men for the bounty on their heads and stopping them from committing any more heinous crimes against the innocent. He rides into the town of Grayson, Texas, with a dead body in tow.There, he finds a beautiful young woman by the name of Julie Handy, who has two sons. He immediately becomes attracted to her and his mind begins a tug of war within itself. One part of him wants to stop hunting men, stay with Julie and try a new way of life. The other tells him he’s not finished with ridding the west of the worst of men. He was finding himself at a crossroads with his life. The struggle continues in his head, but then things turn deadly. Three murders and a bank robbery in Grayson, along with a dire threat to Julie’s safety, force him back into the business. One of the three men who robbed the bank, sends his two partners back to Grayson to kidnap Julie.He hits the trail hard with anger and vengeance coursing through his veins. Along the way, the struggle within him continues. Can he choose another way of life or does he have to continue on the one that was chosen for him. That was a decision he would have to make once he found Julie, praying she would still be alive when he did.