Relationships Friendships

As 14-year-old Christy leaves her family's Wisconsin farm to spend the summer at her wealthy aunt and uncle's home in Newport Beach, she hopes this will be the best summer of her life. When she meets surfer Todd with his screaming silver blue eyes, she's certain it will be. But when the summer doesn't unfold as Christy had hoped, she wonders if she'll keep her promise to her parents not to do anything she'll regret. Will she do anything to get Todd's attention, to be accepted, to force her summer to give her everything it promised?

There are a lot of things Jamie hates about her life: her dark hair, her dad's Stone Age Charter of Curfew Rights, her real name – Jamilah Towfeek. For the past three years Jamie has hidden her Lebanese background from everyone at school. It's only with her email friend John that she can really be herself. But now things are getting complicated: the most popular boy in school is interested in her, but there's no way he would be if he knew the truth.

Winnie Perry went through a lot when she was 11, from shifting friendships to her teenage sister's mood swings. But now that Winnie is 12 - and one step closer to being a teenager herself - there is so much more to deal with. Will her new friendship with Dinah last? Can she handle the pressures of junior high? And, most important, will Winnie survive bra shopping (in public!) with Mom?

Summer in Sand Lake isn't complete without a trip to Meade Creamery - the local ice cream stand founded in 1944 by Molly Meade, who started making ice cream to cheer up her lovesick girlfriends while all the boys were away at war. Since then, the stand has been owned and managed exclusively by local girls, who inevitably become the best of friends.

What if your town was sliding underwater, and everyone was ordered to pack up and leave? How would you and your friends spend your last days together? While the adults plan for the future, box up their possessions, and find new places to live, Keeley Hewitt and her friends decide to go out with a bang.

Can the Beacon Street Girls' magic act bring the house down at Abigail Adams Junior High's talent show? Maeve, Avery, Katani, Isabel, and Charlotte face their toughest challenges yet - keeping the Movie House from going out of business and helping Isabel deal with too many demands from the Queens of Mean. Plus, Maeve's relationship with Dillon is shaky, and Marty has a crush on a pink poodle owned by the fascinating Ms. Razzberry Pink. The BSG feel like they're dealing with a juggling act, not a magic act. Can they pull everything off and save the theater?

Ariana Osgood has everything she's ever wanted: A place at elite Atherton-Pryce boarding school. Fabulous friends. A new crush. And most important, a new identity. Now that she's officially become Briana Leigh Covington, Ariana's troubled past is dead and buried. Or is it? When the one person who knows her secret arrives on campus, Ariana decides it's time to say good-bye to her ex-best friend---forever.

Brooklyn Stevens sits in a pool of her own blood, tied up and gagged. No one outside of these dank basement walls knows she’s here. No one can hear her scream. A terrifying tale in the tradition of Carrie and The Exorcist.

Los Angeles is all about the sweet life: hot clubs, cute guys, designer... everything. Nineteen-year-old Jane Roberts can't wait to start living it up. She may be in L.A. for an internship, but Jane plans to play as hard as she works, and has enlisted her BFF Scarlett to join in the fun. When Jane and Scarlett are approached by a producer who wants them to be on his new series, a "reality version of Sex and the City," they can hardly believe their luck. Their own show? Yes, please!

Matt and Mike are best friends, just two working-class guys trying to earn some money in Montauk for the summer. When they meet Driana, JoJo, and Stef, three friends who live much different lives of privilege, Matt and Mike find themselves in a sticky situation where temptation rivals sensibility. Worlds collide when the group ventures out to sea aboard a small boat that Stef sneaks out from her dad's dock. As the waves rise and the fragile vessel weakens, things go horribly wrong. Adrift at sea for days, who will have what it takes to survive?

Three Mormon high school friends, perky Nikki, studious Alicia, and football player Sam, make a pact of the Pygmalion style—they decide to help the “untapped” students at their school. Their plan is to transform three classmates and take them to the prom. But the experiment doesn’t go exactly as planned. They slowly begin to realize that there is more to most people than meets the eye.

Tomi was born in Hawaii. His grandfather and parents were born in Japan and came to America to escape poverty. World War II seems far away from Tomi and his friends, who are too busy playing ball on their eighth-grade team, the Rats. But then Pearl Harbor is attacked by the Japanese, and the United States declares war on Japan. Japanese men are rounded up, and Tomi’s father and grandfather are arrested. It’s a terrifying time to be Japanese in America. But one thing doesn’t change: the loyalty of Tomi’s buddies, the Rats.

Welcome to New York City's Upper East Side, where my friends and I all live in huge, fabulous apartments and go to exclusive single-sex private schools. We aren't always the nicest people in the world, but we make up for it in looks and taste.

From best-selling author Maggie Stiefvater, a gripping tale of darkness, miracles, and family. At the heart of Bicho Raro, Colorado you will find the Soria family, who all have the ability to perform unusual miracles.

Charlotte Kraus would follow Angelika Haas anywhere. Which is how she finds herself in an underground club one Friday night the summer before World War II, dancing to contraband American jazz and swing music, suddenly feeling that anything might be possible. Unable to resist the allure of sharing this secret with Geli, Charlie returns to the club again and again, despite the dangers of breaking the Nazi Party’s rules. Soon, terrified by the tightening vise of Hitler’s power, Charlie and the other Swingjugend are drawn to larger and larger acts of rebellion.

Vera’s spent her whole life secretly in love with her best friend, Charlie Kahn. And over the years she’s kept a lot of his secrets. Even after he betrayed her. Even after he ruined everything. So when Charlie dies in dark circumstances, Vera knows a lot more than anyone - the kids at school, his family, even the police. But will she emerge to clear his name? Does she even want to? Edgy and gripping, Please Ignore Vera Dietz is an unforgettable novel: Smart, funny, dramatic, and always surprising.

When journalist Isabel Vincent befriends Edward, both are at a crossroads: He wants to follow his late wife to the grave, and she is ready to give up on love. Isabel's friend, Edward's daughter, lives far away and has asked Isabel to check in on her dad in New York. At first Isabel is just doing her duty. But soon this charming, elegant, cultured man has become her dear friend. She gives him a reason to go on without his beloved wife of 72 years, and he gives her a renewed faith that happiness is possible.

Anyone, whatever their age, gender, culture, or abilities, can find themselves separate and disconnected from others and feeling lonely. If you feel lonely, you are lonely. And it's not nice. But your situation can change for the better! In Lonely Less, best-selling author Gill Hasson delivers practical strategies you can implement immediately to counter loneliness and connect with other people.

In Let's Take the Long Way Home, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Gail Caldwell offers a powerful and moving memoir about her coming-of-age in mid-life and her extraordinary friendship with Caroline Knapp, the author of Drinking: A Love Story. Though they are more different than alike, these two fiercely private, independent women quickly relax into a friendship more profound than either of them expected. They grow increasingly inseparable until, in 2003, Caroline is diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer.

Benson Fisher thought that a scholarship to Maxfield Academy would be the ticket out of his dead-end life. He was wrong. Now he’s trapped in a school that’s surrounded by a razor-wire fence. A school where video cameras monitor his every move. Where there are no adults. Where the kids have split into groups in order to survive. Where breaking the rules equals death. But when Benson stumbles upon the school’s real secret, he realizes that playing by the rules could spell a fate worse than death, and that escape - his only real hope for survival - may be impossible.