“The emotional range and depth of [Willis’s stories], the clarity and deftness, are astonishing.”—Alice Munro The characters in these thirteen masterful and engaging stories exist on the edge of danger, where landscapes melt into dreamscapes and every house is haunted. A drug dealer’s girlfriend signs up for the first manned mission to Mars. A girl falls in love with a man who wants to turn her into a bird. A teenaged girl and her best friend test their relationship by breaking into suburban houses. A wife finds a gaping hole in the floor of the home she shares with her husband, a hole that only she can see. Full of longing and strange humor, these subtle, complex stories—about the love between a man and his pet crow, an alcoholic and his AA sponsor, a mute migrant and a newspaper reporter—show how love ties us to each other and to the world. The Dark and Other Love Stories announces the emergence of a wonderfully gifted storyteller whose stories enlarge our perceptions about the human capacity to love.

From the Pulitzer Finalist and universally beloved author of the New York Times best sellers Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove, a stunning new collection of short fiction that showcases Karen Russell’s extraordinary, irresistible gifts of language and imagination. Karen Russell’s comedic genius and mesmerizing talent for creating outlandish predicaments that uncannily mirror our inner in lives is on full display in these eight exuberant, arrestingly vivid, unforgettable stories. In“Bog Girl”, a revelatory story about first love, a young man falls in love with a two thousand year old girl that he’s extracted from a mass of peat in a Northern European bog. In “The Prospectors,” two opportunistic young women fleeing the depression strike out for new territory, and find themselves fighting for their lives. In the brilliant, hilarious title story, a new mother desperate to ensure her infant’s safety strikes a diabolical deal, agreeing to breastfeed the devil in exchange for his protection. The landscape in which these stories unfold is a feral, slippery, purgatorial space, bracketed by the void—yet within it Russell captures the exquisite beauty and tenderness of ordinary life. Orange World is a miracle of storytelling from a true modern master.

In a dark, dark room, in a soft, soft voice, tell a scary story! Newly reillustrated, this classic I Can Read full of spooky stories is perfect for beginning readers who love a bit of a scare. Victor Rivas’s silly and spooky art will introduce a new generation to stories inspired by traditional folktales like “The Teeth,” “In the Graveyard,” “The Green Ribbon,” “In A Dark, Dark Room,” “The Night It Rained,” “The Pirate,” and “The Ghost of John.” The original edition has won many state awards and is an ALA Notable Children’s Book. In a Dark, Dark Room is a Level Two I Can Read book, geared for kids who read on their own but still need a little help.

Two strangers in Paris ...One passionate, earth-shattering kiss.He was the artist upstairswith the tantalizing smile and laughing eyes.He was the devil inviting me to sin,seducing me to dance in the bright moonlight.He was desire and need.When he touched me, my body sang.My soul came alive.But I belonged to another man,and he didn't want to let me go.

Can anyone be truly herself - or truly in love - in a language that's not her own? Sixteen-year-old Josie knows a lot of languages- she speaks High School, College, Friends, Boyfriends, Break-ups, and even the language of Beautiful Girls. But none of these is her native tongue - the only people who speak that are her best friend Stu and her sister, Kate. So when Kate gets engaged to an insufferable guy, how can Josie see it as anything but the mistake of a lifetime? As battles are waged over secrets and semantics, Josie is forced to examine her feelings for the boy who says he loves her, the sister she loves but doesn't always like, and the best friend who hasn't said a word - at least not in a language Josie understands. 'A true-blue lovable weirdo, Josie is the type of character I really enjoy seeing . . . authentically herself, even when being herself gets her into trouble.' Hellogiggles

A French teacher who collects fiancés; a fortune-teller who fails to predict the heartbreak of her own daughter; an aging cowboy seduced by a city girl . . . these are some of the unforgettable people who live in these pages. In Vanishing and Other Stories, secrets are both kept and unearthed, and lives are shaped by missing lovers, parents, and children. With wisdom and dexterity, moments of dark humor, and a remark- able economy of words, Deborah Willis captures an incredible array of characters that linger in the imagination and prove that nothing is ever truly forgotten.