Serendipity happens when people, places, time and events intersect and something inexplicably good emerges. Serendipity intrigues, as it brings good fortune. Those who embrace it are often considered idealistic and wishful, or even wacky. In We Built the Bridge, author Grace Fala makes serendipity real. Magical stories often stay within the parameters of acceptable norms. They generally involve children and parents-typically, individuals who identify and relate as man and woman. But this fairytale doesn't follow the mainstream. This serendipitous story graced two unlikely singletons-two whimsical and, according to customs, maverick women. While searching for an affordable home in a suburban area, something unbelievable threw them off course. A strange energy gripped and carried them toward a house charmed with magnetic forces, as if calling their names. Fala reflects on how two women from Philadelphia who love one another now make their home in a farming valley among the Amish. Praise for We Built the Bridge A delightful, passionate, playful, and significant story, not just for those who live in or visit Pennsylvania's Amish country, but for us all. -Virginia Ramey Mollenkott, PhD, Author, Omnigender, Sensuous Spirituality, and other books
CRIME A policeman lies seriously injured in a Liverpool cellar. Only two little girls know where he is but they're too scared to tell. Time is running out for the policeman. Will the girls get help before it's too late? Piggy Monk Square is a dark and humorous novel set in 1970's Liverpool; during the period of time that preceded the Toxteth riots. THRILLER It describes a world tainted with a deep mistrust and hostility between the local people and the police force. This world is viewed through the eyes of a nine-year-old girl, Rebecca. Rebecca's parents are splitting up. Her best friend, Debbie, has a father who is constantly in and out of prison. Their world is dark, confusing and frequently brutal. The girls sometimes mix reality with fantasy, especially when it comes to coping with what will soon become their terrible secret. SECRETS Rebecca and Debbie are playing in the cellar of a derelict house when a policeman catches them. He bullies them and warns them not to return. But this is their favourite place to play and they come back. Unfortunately for them so does the policeman. The policeman chases the girls, but falls down a ladder and goes 'asleep.' The girls know they shouldn't have been playing there. They have also been taught not to trust the police. They are afraid of getting into trouble, so they leave him. The injured policeman becomes dependent on the 'goodwill' of Rebecca and Debbie whose interpretation of 'helping' him has terrible consequences for them all. REVIEWS FOR PIGGY MONK SQUARE 'A stunningly well-written novel. I didn't want it to end. Tense, joyous, terrifying, comic, tender, magic and tragic - just like childhood itself.' -Willy Russell 'Piggy Monk Square is unbearably tense and utterly believable. The voice of its young heroine is so beguiling and convincing that you feel that you've met her. And then the story forces you to share her terrible secret. Like the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle: illuminating and satisfying.' -Frank Cottrell Boyce 'Nine-year-old Rebecca, chirpy as her nickname, "Sparra", is the lively narrator of this disturbing child's-eye view of 1970s Toxteth, over which the spectres of poverty and police brutality hang. Her mum and dad quarrel and she hates school, where the sadistic Mr. Shelby hits her for misdemeanors. Sparra and her friend Debbie get their kicks roaming the streets, fighting their arch-enemies Uffo and Lippo, laughing at the drunken antics of crazy Harold and his wife with their dead baby's pram, and running from the man they call Stabber the psycho-killer. Their favourite place is the cellar of a bombed-out house in Piggy Monk Square, but that is spoilt when a scary cop warns them away. The tables are turned when the cop falls into the cellar and lies there injured. The real punch of this slice-of-life tale comes from the appalling isolation of Sparra's childhood. The punch leaves you gasping.' -Rachel Hore - The Guardian 'Capturing the vividness of childhood and the exuberant cadence of Liverpudlian childhood slang. It's a subtle but compulsively readable novel, combining the bittersweet provincial nostalgia of, say, Meera Syal's Anita and Me, with a dark and subversive parable that has echoes of Whistle down the Wind.' -Laurence Phelan - Independent On Sunday 'A gripping, intriguing page-turner which bears testimony to the craft of Jolliffe...mirrors the first person appeal of the autistic teenager in Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident Of the Dog in the Night Time. Grace's Liverpool childhood has helped her create a truly believable character in her book. It's also laced with some wry scouse humour too.' -Mike Chapple - Daily Post 'Within a very few pages this novel draws you in. Piggy Monk Square deserves success and would certainly make a great film.' -Maria Ross - Publishing News
The Adventures of 3 is a story about a bear, a bird, and a bug. One of them finds a mysterious object (a leaf) and together they learn about one of God's many gifts of love and beauty right in their own backyard. Wow
The Adventures of 3 is a story about a bear, a bird, and a bug. One of them finds a mysterious object (a leaf) and together they learn about one of God's many gifts of love and beauty right in their own backyard. Wow
Often, too many dark, brown, Black and chocolate skinned girls have low self-esteem about their perfectly given natural hair; so the author Trina and her daughter, Grace, wanted this book to be a reminder that their hair is beautiful just the way it is. Join Trina and Grace in this journey
The Journey of Jesus / El Viaje de Jesus is the most important book in the SonShip Series; Children's Books for Bilingual Learning Collection. It is the only one written in a Poetic format but what set's it apart is that it will satisfy a child's quest for adventure and the need to be rescued. Jesus is the prototype for every good heroic action figure. Many children (adults too) idolize a great hero. Although these are staged productions and fictional characters, the reality of Jesus and all His miracles made a change then and will continue to change lives, give hope, and inspire children and adults to greatness. Come along and find yourself along this journey of Jesus.
Grace M. Cho grew up as the daughter of a white American merchant marine and the Korean bar hostess he met abroad. They were one of few immigrants in a xenophobic small town during the Cold War, where identity was politicized by everyday details--language, cultural references, memories, and food. When Grace was fifteen, her dynamic mother experienced the onset of schizophrenia, a condition that would continue and evolve for the rest of her life. Part food memoir, part sociological investigation, Tastes Like War is a hybrid text about a daughter's search through intimate and global history for the roots of her mother's schizophrenia. In her mother's final years, Grace learned to cook dishes from her parent's childhood in order to invite the past into the present, and to hold space for her mother's multiple voices at the table. And through careful listening over these shared meals, Grace discovered not only the things that broke the brilliant, complicated woman who raised her--but also the things that kept her alive. Grace M. Cho is the author of Haunting the Korean Diaspora: Shame, Secrecy, and the Forgotten War, which received a 2010 book award from the American Sociological Association. She teaches at the College of Staten Island, CUNY.
Give your child the joy of beautiful words. Recitations for Girls and Boys gathers short, lively pieces chosen especially for ages six to ten-perfect for memory work, morning time, or a small performance at home. From a proud tin soldier and a foolish lamb to mushroom hunts at dawn and Red Riding Hood's dash through the woods, these charming selections invite clear speech, imagination, and delight. Parents and teachers will appreciate the varied lengths, natural rhythms, and cheery themes that help hesitant speakers find their voice while strong readers grow in expression and confidence.
Give your child the joy of beautiful words. Recitations for Girls and Boys gathers short, lively pieces chosen especially for ages six to ten-perfect for memory work, morning time, or a small performance at home. From a proud tin soldier and a foolish lamb to mushroom hunts at dawn and Red Riding Hood's dash through the woods, these charming selections invite clear speech, imagination, and delight. Parents and teachers will appreciate the varied lengths, natural rhythms, and cheery themes that help hesitant speakers find their voice while strong readers grow in expression and confidence.
