Books with author Stephen Mark

Brock Lane goes to a club with friend and teammate Malik Thomas to let off some steam and forget about the robbery and kidnapping that just took place. He meets a girl that could potentially be competition for Naomi to win his heart and affection, but he sees through her mask of deception. He also sees his ex-girlfriend Michelle Jackson at the bar of the club, and she reveals some damning information that could blow the case against the hitman crew sky high and bring them to justice. The next day, Brock's sisters Nicole and Jasmine come to town for Mother's Day and spark drama among the entire family. Jasmine reveals her feelings for Malik, but he doesn't quite know how to respond to her advances. Will Malik and Jasmine get together? And will Brock bring down the thugs responsible for the heist or put his life in danger once again? Frenemy is the second installment of the series.

Brock Lane goes to a club with friend and teammate Malik Thomas to let off some steam and forget about the robbery and kidnapping that just took place. He meets a girl that could potentially be competition for Naomi to win his heart and affection, but he sees through her mask of deception. He also sees his ex-girlfriend Michelle Jackson at the bar of the club, and she reveals some damning information that could blow the case against the hitman crew sky high and bring them to justice. The next day, Brock's sisters Nicole and Jasmine come to town for Mother's Day and spark drama among the entire family. Jasmine reveals her feelings for Malik, but he doesn't quite know how to respond to her advances. Will Malik and Jasmine get together? And will Brock bring down the thugs responsible for the heist or put his life in danger once again? Frenemy is the second installment of the series.

“Extraordinary...beautifully precise...[an] earnestly ambitious debut.” —The New York Times Book Review “A wild, angry, and devastating masterpiece of a book.” —NPR “[A] descendent of the Dickensian ‘social novel’ by way of Jonathan Franzen: epic fiction that lays bare contemporary culture clashes, showing us who we are and how we got here.” —O, The Oprah Magazine “A book that has stayed with me ever since I put it down.” —Seth Meyers, host of Late Night with Seth MeyersOne sweltering night in 2013, four former high school classmates converge on their hometown in northeastern Ohio. There’s Bill Ashcraft, a passionate, drug-abusing young activist whose flailing ambitions have taken him from Cambodia to Zuccotti Park to post-BP New Orleans, and now back home with a mysterious package strapped to the undercarriage of his truck; Stacey Moore, a doctoral candidate reluctantly confronting her family and the mother of her best friend and first love, whose disappearance spurs the mystery at the heart of the novel; Dan Eaton, a shy veteran of three tours in Iraq, home for a dinner date with the high school sweetheart he’s tried desperately to forget; and the beautiful, fragile Tina Ross, whose rendezvous with the washed-up captain of the football team triggers the novel’s shocking climax. Set over the course of a single evening, Ohio toggles between the perspectives of these unforgettable characters as they unearth dark secrets, revisit old regrets and uncover—and compound—bitter betrayals. Before the evening is through, these narratives converge masterfully to reveal a mystery so dark and shocking it will take your breath away.

Julian Brown's life is in turmoil when his wife Vanessa of eighteen years files for a divorce, and he loses his job within a two-year span. He tries to pick up the pieces of his fractured existence only to be crushed completely by another blow, the murder of his thirteen-year-old son Miles. Julian fights to keep his sanity and stops at nothing to find the person or persons responsible for his son's death, even if it means putting his own life in danger. Blind Fury is a story of survival and determination in the unforgiving streets of Chicago.

Gift your kid the awesome of having lots of fun while they learn!Over100+ coloring pages and Alphabet pictures your child will develop the motor control for writing well while also learning to recognize each letter.Are you looking for a workbook that has everything your kid needs to start reading and writing?Do you want your little one to have so much fun, they won't know they are learning?✓ you will love Toddler ABC Booklet!This workbook helps kids of all ages to start learning letters of the alphabet and to improve their handwriting.This fun ABC Book is the perfect start for any child to learn how to write.This book includes:✓ Alphabet pictures from A to Z.✓ Coloring Pages.✓ Shrt Story for Alphabet. Letter A Activity:◆ Color Poster◆ Colour Picture◆ Trace ◆ Fluency Sentences ◆ Maze Age specifications:This early learning activity book is geared to boys and girls aged from 2 to 6 years old but it is suitable for any child (toddlers, preschool and kindergarten) who shows interest in writing. Your kid will love it!Buy now to help your kids enjoy learning and be successful in school and life!Gift your kid the awesome of having lots of fun while they learn!Over100+ coloring pages and Alphabet pictures your child will develop the motor control for writing well while also learning to recognize each letter.Are you looking for a workbook that has everything your kid needs to start reading and writing?Do you want your little one to have so much fun, they won't know they are learning?✓ you will love Toddler ABC Booklet!This workbook helps kids of all ages to start learning letters of the alphabet and to improve their handwriting.This fun ABC Book is the perfect start for any child to learn how to write.This book includes:✓ Alphabet pictures from A to Z.✓ Coloring Pages.✓ Shrt Story for Alphabet. Letter A Activity:◆ Color Poster◆ Colour Picture◆ Trace ◆ Fluency Sentences ◆ Maze Age specifications:This early learning activity book is geared to boys and girls aged from 2 to 6 years old but it is suitable for any child (toddlers, preschool and kindergarten) who shows interest in writing. Your kid will love it!Buy now to help your kids enjoy learning and be successful in school and life!

Is it possible? Can an ordinary human being really become a perfect person in three short days? Milo Crinkley thought so. What gave him the idea was a book that fell on his head one day at the library--a book with the impressive title Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days! The author, Dr. K. Pinkerton Silverfish, did look kind of weird, but he claimed to be the world's leading authority on perfection. Milo took the book home and followed its instructions. He liked the idea of being perfect. Perfect people never had their parents nag at them. Perfect people never had to take the blame for rotten tricks their sisters played. Perfect people never needed erasers. Perfect was obviously the perfect thing to be! Did Milo become a perfect person in just three days? More important, can you? Do you think we're going to answer all your questions here when we want you to read this hilarious book?Winner of five kid-voted statewide awards! California Young Reader Medal Charlie May Simon Award (Arkansas) Georgia Children's Book Award Nene Award (Hawaii) Sunshine State Award (Florida)

The internationally acclaimed new book that takes you behind the scenes to reveal how ballet really happens: In a scuffed-up studio, a veteran dancer transmits the magic of an eighty-year-old ballet to a performer barely past drinking age. In a converted barn, an indomitable teacher creates ballerinas as she has for more than half a century. In a monastic mirrored room, dancers from as near as New Jersey and as far as Mongolia learn works as old as the nineteenth century and as new as this morning. "Where Snowflakes Dance and Swear" zooms in on an intimate view of one full season in the life of one of America's top ballet companies and schools: Seattle's Pacific Northwest Ballet. But it also tracks the Land of Ballet to venues as celebrated as New York and Monte Carlo and as seemingly ordinary as Bellingham, Washington and small-town Pennsylvania. Never before has a book taken readers backstage for such a wide-ranging view of the ballet world from the wildly diverse perspectives of dancers, choreographers, stagers, teachers, conductors, musicians, rehearsal pianists, lighting directors, costumers, stage managers, scenic artists, marketers, fundraisers, students, and even pointe shoe fitters--often in their own remarkably candid words. The book follows characters as colorful as they are talented. Versatile dancers team up with novice choreographers and those as renowned as Susan Stroman, Christopher Wheeldon, and Twyla Tharp to create art on deadline. At the book's center is Peter Boal, a former New York City Ballet star in his third year as PNB's artistic director, as he manages conflicting constituencies with charm, tact, rationality and diplomacy. Readers look over Boal's shoulder as he makes tough decisions about programming, casting, scheduling and budgeting that eventually lead the calm, low-key leader to declare that in his job, "You have to be willing to be hated." "Where Snowflakes Dance and Swear" shows how ballet is made, funded, and sold. It escorts you front and center to the kick zone of studio rehearsals. It takes you to the costume shop where elegant tutus and gowns are created from scratch. It brings you backstage to see sets and lighting come alive while stagehands get lovingly snarky and obscene on their headsets. It sits you down in meetings where budgets get slashed and dreams get funded--and axed. It shows you the inner workings of Nutcracker, from kids' charming auditions to no-nonsense marketing meetings, from snow bags in the flies to dancing snowflakes who curse salty flurries that land on their tongues. It follows the tempestuous assembly of a version of Romeo and Juliet that runs afoul of so much pressure, disease, injury, and blood that the dancers begin to call it cursed. The book uncovers the astounding way ballets, with no common form of written preservation, are handed down via the prodigious memories of brilliant athletes who also happen to be artists. It goes on tour with the company to Vail, Colorado, where dancers contend with altitude that makes their muscles cramp and their lungs ache. It visits cattle-call auditions and rigorous classes, tells the stories of dancers whose parents sacrificed for them and dancers whose parents refused to. It meets the resolute woman who created a dance school more than fifty years ago in a Carlisle, Pennsylvania barn and grew it into one of America's most reliable ballerina factories. It shows ballet's appeal to kids from low-income neighborhoods and board members who live in mansions. Shattering longstanding die-for-your-art clichés, this book uncovers the real drama in the daily lives of fiercely dedicated union members in slippers and pointe shoes--and the musicians, stagehands, costumers, donors and administrators who support them. "Where Snowflakes Dance and Swear: Inside the Land of Ballet" brings readers the exciting truth of how ballet actually happens.

From the author of Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days!How many things can go wrong on a summer vacation? The Hooples are about to find out!Alvin Hoople just can't wait to get to Philadelphia. He'll see the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and the U.S. Mint, where rumor has it they give out free samples. Better yet: a Phillies baseball game. It's Bat Night, where every fan gets a full-sized souvenir!The trip is fun at first, with Monsterburgers, Mr. Clam, and cows that give chocolate milk all part of what looks like a great vacation. But once the Hooples get on the superhighway, everything seems to go wrong. Alvin's little sister Annie keeps losing Lambie, her favorite stuffed toy. The weather threatens to get everybody all wet. And then there's the worst problem of all: car trouble.A ride in a tow truck is definitely a hoot, but it's no Phillies game. Will things ever get back to normal? And will Alvin get his souvenir bat at the end of the most hilarious car trip ever?Drive in and see!

Is it possible? Can an ordinary human being really become a perfect person in three short days?Milo Crinkley thought so. What gave him the idea was a book that fell on his head one day at the library--a book with the impressive title Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days! The author, Dr. K. Pinkerton Silverfish, did look kind of weird, but he claimed to be the world's leading authority on perfection.Milo took the book home and followed its instructions. He liked the idea of being perfect. Perfect people never had their parents nag at them. Perfect people never had to take the blame for rotten tricks their sisters played. Perfect people never needed erasers. Perfect was obviously the perfect thing to be!Did Milo become a perfect person in just three days? More important, can you?Do you think we're going to answer all your questions here when we want you to read this hilarious book?Winner of five kid-voted statewide awards! California Young Reader MedalCharlie May Simon Award (Arkansas) Georgia Children's Book AwardNene Award (Hawaii)Sunshine State Award (Florida)A personal message from Dr. K. Pinkerton Silverfish, world's leading expert on perfection:● Maybe you think it's all a lot of baloney. Maybe you think nobody can become perfect in three short days. Well, maybe you should think again!● Here's my no-risk guarantee: Try this book for just three days. If you're not absolutely delighted with the results, you can go soak your head. Now, what could be fairer than that?● I won't be satisfied until every man, woman, and child on the face of the earth completes my amazing crash course in perfection. So, remember: If you don't read this book, I'm going to tell on you!

The internationally acclaimed new book that takes you behind the scenes to reveal how ballet really happens: In a scuffed-up studio, a veteran dancer transmits the magic of an eighty-year-old ballet to a performer barely past drinking age. In a converted barn, an indomitable teacher creates ballerinas as she has for more than half a century. In a monastic mirrored room, dancers from as near as New Jersey and as far as Mongolia learn works as old as the nineteenth century and as new as this morning. Snowflakes zooms in on an intimate view of one full season in the life of one of America's top ballet companies and schools: Seattle's Pacific Northwest Ballet. But it also tracks the Land of Ballet to venues as celebrated as New York and Monte Carlo and as seemingly ordinary as Bellingham, Washington and small-town Pennsylvania. Never before has a book taken readers backstage for such a wide-ranging view of the ballet world from the wildly diverse perspectives of dancers, choreographers, stagers, teachers, conductors, musicians, rehearsal pianists, lighting directors, costumers, stage managers, scenic artists, marketers, fundraisers, students, and even pointe shoe fitters--often in their own remarkably candid words. The book follows characters as colorful as they are talented. Versatile dancers from around the globe team up with novice choreographers and those as renowned as Susan Stroman, Christopher Wheeldon, and Twyla Tharp to create art on deadline. At the book's center is Peter Boal, a former New York City Ballet star in his third year as PNB's artistic director, as he manages conflicting constituencies with charm, tact, rationality and diplomacy. Readers look over Boal's shoulder as he makes tough decisions about programming, casting, scheduling and budgeting that eventually lead the calm, low-key leader to declare that in his job, "You have to be willing to be hated." Snowflakes shows how ballet is made, funded, and sold. It escorts you front and center to the kick zone of studio rehearsals. It takes you to the costume shop where elegant tutus and gowns are created from scratch. It brings you backstage to see sets and lightingwi come alive while stagehands get lovingly snarky and obscene on their headsets. It sits you down in meetings where budgets get slashed and dreams get funded-and axed. It shows you the inner workings of Nutcracker, from kids' charming auditions to no-nonsense marketing meetings, from snow bags in the flies to dancing snowflakes who curse salty flurries that land on their tongues. It follows the tempestuous assembly of a version of Romeo and Juliet that runs afoul of so much pressure, disease, injury, and blood that the dancers begin to call it cursed. Snowflakes uncovers the astounding way ballets, with no common form of written preservation, are handed down from generation to generation through the prodigious memories of brilliant athletes who also happen to be artists. It goes on tour with the company to Vail, Colorado, where dancers contend with altitude that makes their muscles cramp and their lungs ache. It visits cattle-call auditions and rigorous classes, tells the stories of dancers whose parents sacrificed for them and dancers whose parents refused to. It meets the resolute woman who created a dance school more than fifty years ago in a Carlisle, Pennsylvania barn and grew it into one of America's most reliable ballerina factories. It shows ballet's appeal to kids from low-income neighborhoods and board members who live in mansions. Shattering longstanding die-for-your-art clichés, this book uncovers the real drama in the daily lives of fiercely dedicated union members in slippers and pointe shoes-and the musicians, stagehands, costumers, donors and administrators who support them. Where Snowflakes Dance and Swear: Inside the Land of Ballet brings readers the exciting truth of how ballet actually happens.