Books published by publisher BookBaby

In a spur-of-the-moment decision made in the chaos of a crowded Edinburgh railway station at the start of World War II, two young evacuees trade places, names and lives. Shy, wealthy Marjorie Malcolm Scott, on her way to stay with relatives in Canada, becomes Shona McInnes, an adventurous orphan bound for a small town in the south of Scotland. Neither girl foresees that the war will last for six years. In taking Shona's name, Marjorie inherits a battered suitcase containing Shona's only possessions--a few shabby clothes and an oil painting of a large Victorian house, Shona's only clue to her past. Marjorie also has charge of Anna, a backward child from the orphanage who was assigned to Shona's care.Marjorie and Anna are billeted with two kindly, but eccentric, middle-aged sisters. Despite the hardship of war, Marjorie’s life as Shona is happy in ways it never was before. But as she makes plans for the future, the question of who she really is haunts her, and at the war’s end she knows she must search for the real Shona and settle the question of her identity.

A magical world deep in a lovely garden lives a lively group of mystical creatures. Their adventures in the garden and their unique personalities create joy for all the young as well as the young at heart. Norman the Slugg Bugg Meet Norman marks the first in a series of books meant to spark the imagination of a colorful and fun world. As the series progresses, there will be lessons about family, friends, and many, many adventures.

With the turn of a glowing key, four children are transported back to the fifteenth century when they open the door to an ancient Scottish tower. Back then border raiding was a way of life and Andrew witnesses the battle to retake Roxburgh Castle from the English. On a second visit, hoping to retrieve Ollie, the youngest child, they find themselves in the distant future.

This book is a compendium of wisdom teachings from the Pachakuti Mesa tradition founded by don Oscar Miro-Quesada from Lima, Peru. The book is designed to offer the reader a comprehensive resource and guide to understanding the essential components of this tradition, its guiding principles, and concepts of energetic healing. The central focus of this book revolves around the use of an altar system known as a Pachakuti Mesa, which functions as the repository of wisdom for this shamanic lineage (an oral tradition that dates back thousands of years). Every piece on the altar holds its own story (and medicine), and when these stories are brought together as a system, the altar itself describes the unique cosmovision and mythology of the tradition, as well as the reciprocal relationship humanity shares with the natural world.This traditional wisdom also revolves around ancient and effective forms of energetic healing, which are passed down through the use of this sacred altar. This book seeks to unveil the methodology of this particular form of tribal shamanic practice in a way that is accessible to the western aspirant by offering parallels and cultural comparisons as well as references from leading scholars in the field of anthropology. Ultimately this book is designed to provide a “behind the scenes” account of the ritual practices and teachings of this tradition, while also offering the reader practical and pragmatic tools for applying this traditional wisdom to one’s modern day life. This book also breaks down the essential components of ceremony to empower the reader with the ability to begin practicing these ritual arts at home or in their personal private practice. Through the exploration of these ancient forms of healing, ceremony, and rites of passage, the Pachakuti Mesa is revealed as a control panel of sorts, which can be used to access and navigate the inner, outer, and transcendent worlds. Through ceremony, this altar comes to life, providing the shaman with an experience of direct connection and communication with the spiritual dimensions of the living world. It is from this direct connection that he/she is able to hold their community in ritual, provide healing, and offer guidance and mentorship to those who require it. This book is designed to reveal the inner and outer workings of this ancient altar system, and describes not only what many of its individual pieces represent, but how each of them are used as a system for personal growth, and to heal and serve one’s community and the living world.

When I reminisce on my childhood, what stands out the most are my memories in nature. I look back fondly on these simple moments, far from screens and often even far from toys. Emerging research continues to highlight the diverse benefits children attain when they are allowed ample time to play freely outdoors. As screens become more prevalent, it can be difficult to find time to play outside. Screens are not evil. They provide significant advantages in many facets of life. The danger of screen time for children is that each moment on a screen represents opportunities for real world experiences that are lost along the way. When screen use is fairly minimal, this does not cause any significant problems. We must, however, be aware that child development is thwarted when there is a large imbalance between virtual play and outdoor play.This book is an offshoot of the 1000 Hours Outside movement, a movement I created in 2013 that challenges parents to match outside time with screen time over the course of a calendar year. Some time back I asked a question to adults on social media about where their love for nature began. The responses were endearing and inspiring. This book is my response to that question.

Let’s start with what this book is not. This book is not an “introduction to investing” book. Millions of those are out there, and they typically put people to sleep. Therefore, this book is not going to explain: What is a stock? What is a mutual fund? How do you create a family budget? Yada, yada, yada. This book was written for the millions of people who could be called the “mass affluent”—those hardworking, successful individuals and families who have managed to accumulate $500,000 to $10,000,000, and those who are focused upon working toward that kind of affluence. Through meetings with hundreds of current and prospective clients, we have seen how people accumulate small fortunes, and then frequently lose a good portion of them through bad investments and poor planning.Once people retire, they frequently roll over retirement accounts that were administered by their employer to an IRA where they have full control. They also sell businesses or real estate and have a lump sum of money to invest. Most people have never been in the position to invest in this way before, or at least not at this level, and not when the stakes are so high. In fact, most people’s largest assets (in order) are their home, their company retirement plan, and then cash value life insurance. What do those three assets have in common? You typically don’t look at their value every day, and they are not considered liquid by most of their owners.What many people fail to realize when they retire is that they have just employed themselves to become the pension fund manager for themselves and their family’s future. What that means is they may no longer have the luxury of not needing to take income from their investments. When you are in this situation, your investment portfolio has in essence become your employer. The performance of your portfolio will now dictate in large part the lifestyle that you and your family can enjoy in the future. If your portfolio does not generate enough income, you no longer have the option of just working more hours or taking on a side project. Your portfolio is more important now than ever, as are other financial decisions you will be making. You have entered the major leagues of investing and you are up to bat. The questions you now need to ask are:•How should I change my investment mix?•How much can I afford to take from my account on a monthly or annual basis?•From which investments should I take the money?Professional pension fund managers face these questions each day. You now have a decision to make—you can either answer these questions for yourself, or you can hire a professional to answer them for you. It’s a tough decision whether to manage your investments yourself or to hire a professional. If you are considering doing it yourself, you should be aware of some of the mistakes we frequently see among do-it-yourself-ers.The investing failures are not due to people being stupid. The majority of people we meet and work with are quite bright. Many of our clients are Ph.D.’s, engineers, lawyers, CPA’s, successful business owners and college professors. The reason why most people make poor investors is that they are human. Human beings are hard-wired to make decisions with their hearts and justify them with logic. Greed and fear rule the day. Unfortunately, the fear and adrenaline that kept humans alive when we lived in the jungle does not serve us well as modern day investors.This book is going to explain some of the most common ways people destroy themselves (financially). We will also delve into the new and fascinating field of behavioral finance. In other words, we are not just going to list typical mistakes investors make. Rather, we are going to explain WHY people make the same mistakes over and over again. Then we will give you examples of what you can do differently so your investments remain safe and continue to grow.

Gabriella was born and raised in the small Irish village of Kells. Her eyes were like emeralds and her hair the darkest of ginger. By her second decade she found herself among the mean streets of Dublin with her cousin helping her to keep the straight and narrow. As the famine plagued Ireland's countryside in the mid-19th century, the O'Brien family had a decision to make. Would they stay in the only home that they had ever known or bid the Emerald Coast goodbye? Was the North Atlantic and its latter year storms the voyage of a lifetime with brighter days in Boston or would they be safe in the land of their birth, among the crying hearts of Dublin? Travel back in time with them and see where there life leads.

Dereck, is a normal thirteen-year-old boy who has agreed to take care of his five-year-old sister, Jessie, while their mother is away overnight. As the big brother, he intends to keep his sister safe, taking on the role of their dad who died in a car accident the year before.Derek loves his sister, but her constant need of his attention is starting to get on his nerves. However his mom is always reminding him to spend time with his little sister.The only thing Jessie wants Dereck to do is read fairy tales to her, though he would prefer they do anything else like shoot bottle rockets or throw a baseball around. When Jessie takes a nap, a violent storm moves in, causing Dereck to stumble down the steps to the cellar of their home. When Jessie screams out for help, Dereck imagines a tree crashing through her window, trapping his sister in her room. Trying to run to his sister’s rescue, he falls through the cellar floor and wakes up in Oz - an Oz filled with all the fairy-tale characters Jessie loves (and he hates) so much.Right away Dereck meets a farmer and his wife who live on the far side of a cornfield that grows beside the yellow road that weaves itself through Oz. The couple is waiting on the Dorothy girl from Kansas to pass by so they can make a deal with her. If she helps them catch a pesky man-sized crow, they will give her a secret map that shows a shortcut to the Emerald City. But when Miss Glinda warns the farm girl not to take the shortcut, Dereck, with the help of the six-foot crow, decides to ‘borrow’ the map without the farmer’s knowledge so that Dereck can rush to the Wizard as quickly as possible so the great Oz might send him back to his sister who, he knew, was yelling for him to help her. Dereck meets Miss Glinda’s personal assistant who has dressed herself like the good witch and calls herself Glindalina. Right before his eyes, the Wicked Witch of the West talks the assistant into becoming her evil assistant so she can help her make sure Dorothy will get the shortcut map, take the shortcut, and die so the green witch can get her hands on the silver slippers she wants from the farm girl so badly. Miss Glinda is livid and scares the wicked witch away so that she won’t be able to give Dorothy the shortcut map.With the help of Crow, Dereck sneaks the map from Miss Glinda, and takes off down the yellow road where he battles a giant, a wolf, an ogre and somehow loses the yellow road, winding up in the middle of a thick forest where he runs into a little girl who wears a red cloak. The girl introduces him to her grandmother who brings out an old photograph of a young man who favors Dereck a good deal. But how could that be? Within the short visit, the old lady finds out about Dereck planning to take the shortcut and gives him a safety charm since she heard that the shortcut between the yellow road and the Emerald City is a very dangerous path. Dereck makes it to the shortcut path, finding a beautiful lady who quickly morphs into an ugly hag and tells Dereck he must die so that she and the other creatures kept captive there will be freed at last.Dereck remembers bottle rockets in his backpack and uses them to destroy the creature and catch the surrounding forest on fire. Miss Glinda calls for a dragon to take Dereck home then and there. When Dereck arrives back to his house, he finds Jessie hiding in her bedroom closet as the storm outside has started to move away.A few days later, Dereck notices in the artwork of Jessie’s fairy tale books, small things in the background like he had seen on his journey but were never mentioned in the age-old stories. He discovers the artist is from his own hometown and looks up the artist’s picture, realizing he looks very familiar and suddenly remembers the old photograph that Red’s grandma had shown him. That was the artist who had looked like him.But how could that be? Had the artist been to the same place? Dereck may never

The Game That Almost Broke Me is the inspirational story of Tavarski Wallace, an ambitious player in the game of achieving a spot in the NFL, and a resilient player in the turbulent, challenging, and sometimes unfair game of life. The intriguing evolution of "Taz" Wallace is remarkable in this book-long journey, which is marked by milestones of overcoming adversity - from resolving struggles academically, supporting his hard-working single mother, to ultimately managing the unforgiving politics of professional football.From modest beginnings in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Taz documents a series of key relationships which shaped him as an individual and helped fuel his dreams of becoming a linebacker in the NFL. With unrelenting persistence every step of the way, the experiences, failures, and surprising successes of Taz in The Game That Almost Broke Me prove how the American Dream can dramatically transform with time, and may even become something entirely different in the end. In The Game That Almost Broke Me, Taz writes about the decisions that shaped his life. Taz's transparency about his journey will inspire readers to hold on to belief in the midst of adversity and win in the game of life. Perfect for anyone looking for an inspiring story.176 pages

SEA NEVER DRY is an adaptation ( for 4-7 year-olds ) of the extraordinary book TOFI'S FIRE DANCE. Nii, a young boy from the West Coast of Africa stows away on a ship to the land of dreams, The United States of America. He is thrown away to sharks for breakfast because he does not look like the crew of the ship. Protected by a mysterious rainbow fish he washes up on the shore of the South Coast of the Zulu Kingdom. After a misunderstanding over language and culture he is accepted into the cattle herding community.He teaches them how to fish because " Sea never dry ". They teach him about cows because "Cattle is wealth." When Nii has to go home to find his parents after a long stay, Tofi, the girl who hosted him, fights for his return. She is compelled to go on a pulsating search for the magical rainbow fish, and has to dance in fire.The language and its adapted version is rich. The author chooses his words with the carefulness of a surgeon between whose fingers dangles the scalpel upon a human heart. Each line is pregnant with meaning. Each sentence is clothed in poetic beauty.