Weird Life

When we're kids, our parents tell us that being creative is fun, fun, fun. But when you decide to turn art into your career, whether that's painting, writing, drawing, or sculpting Edgar Allan Poe out of earthworms, that's when things get tough. In this insightful and heartfelt guide, artist and speaker Phil Hansen shares his hard-won wisdom from the front lines of life as a professional creative. Hansen provides advice for the difficult moments - the slumps, the creative blocks, the times when something you love doesn't resonate with the world - and gives you the pep talk you need....

Briarcliff Mansion and the land it occupies are owned by Emory University, which refers to it as its "Briarcliff Campus." Fortune and Folly, in part, illuminates the largely lost story of how the mansion, and the entire surrounding neighborhood, got its name. But in order to understand the mansion, we have to understand the man who built it. Briarcliff Mansion once belonged to a man named Asa Candler, Jr.—also known as Buddie. The second son and namesake of Coca-Cola founder Asa Griggs Candler, Buddie was a wealthy real estate developer of great successes and greater failures.

Mat Devine, lead singer of the band Kill Hannah, inadvertently began his own popular advice column after Fuse TV asked him to blog about his life on tour. Mat's humorous and touching column, aptly titled "The Raccoon Society", gained a lot of traction as his fans sought advice on serious issues such as alcoholism, bullying, and self-mutilation, while also touching upon lighter subjects like dealing with siblings, fashion, and going to prom.

Sam has retreated to her late father’s rental house, a safe place to commune with the animals in the greenbelt out back, tend to her garden, and keep her secrets. Her sense of security slowly returns - until an aggressive neighbor from the other side of the ravine fells a tree on her property. How little he regards nature. Or understands its darkness. How little he knows Sam.

Daisy has been working on invisibilizing herself—ever since living with her mother’s violent ex-boyfriend, and now to avoid the school bullies who are targeting her. She keeps a low profile, eating lunch with the librarian instead of in the Lunchroom of Terror and secretly counting whenever she’s anxious.But things are looking up. A new boy has befriended her and seems able to stand up to the bullies, and the stray cat she’s been feeding is starting to almost trust her.

I’m fascinated with ancient history because there are continuous new discoveries which push back the dawn of civilization by thousands of years. In the last couple of decades, the discoveries at Gobekli Tepe in eastern Turkey pushed back man-made structures to the time period of 9,000-11,000 BC, thousands of years before the next known civilizations existed.

When he first started seeing ghosts, Max mistakenly assumed everyone else could see them, too. Now, after years of being blamed for the pranks of mischievous spirits, Max is determined to do whatever it takes to make himself normal. But when he’s sent to spend the summer with his eccentric grandfather, Ramhart, being normal becomes impossible. Here in Glimmerville, bakeries sell enchanted pies, the lake is infested with mermaids, the town’s beloved ghosts roam free, and Ramhart himself is celebrated as the world’s most famous monster hunter.

Emma Mcgraw is slowly making friends at her new school. but when Cynthia calls her weird, Emma is shocked. They are supposed to be best friends! in response, Emma decides that Cynthia’s new name should be bossy pants, and she tells everyone in the class.

Dad's working on his cool dance moves for the local talent search, while Weir's trying out for the school soccer team! Will Weir score a goal, or fall flat?

Something must be done. Vlad Luxor continues to rule the Timeless Province with a cruel hand, and now he's screaming about Inners and Outers, Others and Us. Then when the meanest boy in school is turned into the stinkiest, weirdest creature ever, Henry, Jo, Apollo, and Pirate Girl are asked to do the impossible. Breaking this spell will force them to go on their most dangerous, frightening adventure yet - through the Wilds, the Forest of Knives, and a lodge in the woods belonging to the most terrible bully of all...Vlad Luxor himself.

Did you know soap can burn? It can, my pretties. It can and it does. Fortunately, it cleans up so easily! But yes, the house didn’t smell as “wonderful” as it did “wonder what that smell is” for a couple of weeks. In good news, I found out I can literally leave my crockpot turned on low for weeks without it catching fire, so that’s a handy fact to know. Part how-to, part memoir, My Life as a Kitchen Witch was a surprise hit for fiction writer Red Tash.

Woody wants to get un-weird - and fast! And he'll find help in the most unlikely of places. Woody is forever worried about being different. He thinks himself weird and a bit of a wuss, and two bullies, Della and Casey, make sure he doesn't forget that. It doesn't help that his mum is slightly bonkers. She dresses up as a sheep for a living - mostly for her job as a children's entertainer. And not to mention the fact that she forces Woody to wear old granny jumpers that she finds down the local charity shop.

The first book in the Huggabie Falls trilogy - the funniest, craziest, weirdest series ever written, so far. Kipp Kindle and his friends Tobias Treachery and Cymphany Chan live in Huggabie Falls, the weirdest town on Earth. Weird things happen all the time - that’s normal. But when an extremely weird thing happens Kipp and his friends know that something is wrong. They embark on a fast-paced, action-packed, hilarious adventure to find out what is making everything turn normal and to return the weirdness to Huggabie Falls.

Join Wallace Forbes as he encounters the enigmatic insomniac Alfred Kramer on a train journey like no other. Alfred, with his strange appearance and terrifying dreams, will take you on a mesmerizing ride through time and ancestors. Experience the suspense, excitement, and fear as Alfred unveils the secrets of his Kappa-ray device, allowing him to relive the experiences of his ancestors in his haunting dreams.

To make some extra money for the Feral Zoo, Sammy, Red, and Donny decide to promote their cryptozoology business: investigating animals that don't exist. What could possibly go wrong? Everything! Hired to check out sightings of a ghost dog, the friends uncover the terrifying legend of the Hell Hound. Anyone who is seen by this terrible beast is struck with a death curse. So when Sammy's best friend, Mark, runs into the deadly dog, Sammy knows he doesn't have long to figure out how to save him!

Sammy Feral is a lucky boy. His family runs a zoo, where he spends his time cheerfully hanging out with (to name just a few) orangutans, crocodiles, and snakes. But his good luck has just run out - the entire Feral family has been infected with a mysterious virus that causes them to turn into werewolves. Now his mom, dad, and sisters are howling at the moon, craving raw meat, and worst of all, trying to infect Sammy! Worse, it seems there is an evil professor trying to take over the Feral Zoo - could he have anything to do with the werewolf virus?

Hoping to ditch two months of chicken coops, kale, and her parents’ antiscreen rules, Mac MacLeod sets out to win a citywide food cart scavenger hunt and the money she needs for the summer coding camp of her dreams. But Mac discovers more than just clues during her cross-city sprint - like how her weird parents might not be the worst thing compared to the circumstances of those around her.

From the man behind the popular Wired series "Absurd Creature of the Week", a fun, fascinating collection of unique animals and the unbelievable evolutionary traits they use to survive the most extreme scenarios: zombie ants mind-controlled by a fungus; beautiful salamanders that can regenerate any part of their bodies including their brains; and much more.

When two science-savvy girls create an entire robot world, they don’t expect the robots to come alive. But when a choice must be made, the robots might have to pay the price.

Children may love their older relatives, but it can be a difficult trip when visiting grandparents and older relatives. This book is a playful and touching spin on the anxiety young children feel when visiting elders.